Councillor Tony Sharp of the Waendel Journal has published the results of his reader survey. The results make interesting reading and are well worth popping over to see them for yourself. What becomes obvious when studying the results is that quite a few of the people who took part in the survey were of the Conservative persuasion. This is not a criticism of the survey, Tony is a Conservative blogger therefore many of his visitors share in his political ideology, myself included. The results matched my personal thoughts quite closely, and for me there were not any major surprises. One thing that does stand out from the results is the opinion of the voters on the suitability of David Cameron as leader of the Conservative Party.
Tony has kindly allowed me to reference a few of the results from his survey in this post. For ease I'm going to split Tony's results into 'Agree' and 'Disagree' and I'll leave out the 'undecideds'. Quite alarmingly (for the party) when asked: Is David Cameron in touch with issues that concern you? Only 31.3% of those surveyed agreed, while 62% disagreed. If that is not bad enough, when asked: Has David Cameron lost his way and will he lose the next election? 57.6% agreed and only 30.6% disagreed. There is however a silver lining to this very dark cloud, when asked: Will people support Cameron more when he is able to talk about policy substance? 75.3% agreed, while a mere 13.6% disagreed.
The problem as I see it, is if we were to hold a leadership election today, David Cameron would still come out on top, but not by a clear enough margin to give the party the focus it requires to win the next election. There are too many dissenting voices giving support to calls for a new leader in the shape of David Davis or William Hague. It is quite clear that once our policy is put to the public in a strong and clear fashion, then Cameron and the Conservatives will get the boost needed to overtake Brown and Labour. If we want to win the next election, people are going to have to stop whining and get behind David and the Party's policy. There are others that certain members would like to see lead the Party, but only Cameron has the potential to win the next election.
This Party has destroyed itself in the past, let's not let it happen again. So support David and the new policy if you want to see a Conservative government.
8 comments:
"So support David and the new policy if you want to see a Conservative government." Agreed - though discipline should also be enforced by the party machine (New Labour was ruthlessly good at this). I did think there were hopeful signs when Cameron first dealt with Ali Miraj, but the subsequent failure to silence him has encouraged another donor to criticise the leadership in public.
Elliott,
I agree discipline is needed from the party. The party needs to be strong now more than ever, as the media seem to be favouring Labour.
Sorry, DR but i don't agree. Obviously Davis can't challenge himself, having thrown his weight behind Cameron but the central thing all must realize is Cameron-can't-win.
Now if the Tories wish to stick to principle and live in glorious opposition, fine. But if they wish to admit their error and put the man in the people will warm to across the spectrum - Davis - then now is the time.
I don't think David Davis will attract people from "across the spectrum". Does anyone remember his leadership bid, specifically the speech?!
David Cameron needs to let this summer go, it can't get much worse. Instead, concentrate on the party's conference as that could be a turning point as it was for Duncan-Smith.
Sorry James I have to agree with Marc. And I also hope he's right about the conference being a turning point.
How do you solve a problem like CMD?
Let's start at the very beginning ...
Warsi, a peer, a female peer
Widdecombe, a drop of golden sun
Dave, a name I call myself
Rwanda, a long long way to run
Brown, a twat pulling cred
Straw, a dolt to follow Brown
Tea, I drink with the Rehman’s
That will bring us back to Davis...uh oh
Nice song Harry, you are wasted on blogging.
Thank you ...but some credit must go to Messrs. Rodgers & Hammerstein.
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