Training | 2010.03.17
Hugh Muir's diary
Revealed: how the Cameroons plan to win the election. A matter of cheques and balances
• Why all the fuss about Lord Ashcroft\'s money, asks David Cameron. Our accounts are healthy – the debts are down. It was useful once, but now we don\'t even need it. And there is some truth to that. For the beneficial effect of the Tory poll lead has been to attract many more donations from figures and companies keen to make nice with an incoming government. The coffers are swelling. But what to do with it all? Well, already we are told a deal has been struck with an outside company that will manage the digital side of the Tory manifesto. They have great hopes for dominating the campaign in cyberspace, with an intimidating online presence and a state-of-the-art marketing blitz. There will also be an irritating flurry of Obama campaign-style text messages, sending the Cameroonian doctrine to people\'s mobile phones whether they want it or not. But that\'s not to say that the high command won\'t be meeting the people, and when they do, it is likely to be via upmarket battle buses of the luxurious type favoured by the multimillionaire footballers of Roman Abramovich\'s Chelsea. Elections are always a long, tough grind. But with money, they needn\'t be unpleasant.
• And what more can we say about Donal Blaney , the rightwing Conservative activist whose Young Britons\' Foundation runs "madrasa" training for party election candidates? That\'s the foundation whose leaders say the NHS is a waste of money and global warming is a scam. Views that Tory party chairman Eric Pickles was desperate to distance himself from this week. Well, we know he writes a blog, Blaney\'s Blarney, and that once the "attack dog of the right" was a face on the Conservative-leaning internet channel 18 Doughty Street. And would he be the same Donal Blaney who was a councillor in Hammersmith in 1999, and chair of the party\'s youth wing, Conservative Future; who was forced to defend his activities after being taken to task by the Commission for Racial Equality for a campaign with the slogan Fulham Homes for Fulham People, which made questionable claims about council housing of asylum seekers? "There is no racist implication in the leaflet," insisted the party back then, but certainly the whole thing left a sour taste in the mouth. And yes, that was him.
• Twitter is the world and the world is twitter, but with the character count so limited, people can\'t always say what they mean. For instance, yesterday culture secretary Ben Bradshaw tweeted: "Another brilliant column by Jonathan Freedland in the Guardian plus Steve Bell at his best!" But there\'s confusion. For did he mean the Steve Bell cartoon lampooning George Bush and David Cameron? Or was it the other Steve Bell masterwork – the one in G2 depicting Tony Blair as a war criminal? We are left trying to work it out.
• For it could be the latter. Discipline isn\'t what it was in these, the dog days of New Labour. People speak more freely. They even have a laugh with the press. On Tuesday, said the prime minister\'s spokesman, Gordon chaired a cabinet meeting at which transport secretary Lord Adonis gave a presentation of the UK high-speed rail future. "Lord Adonis received \'a ripple of applause\' after he called himself \'the thin controller\'," said the spokesman, a reference to the Fat Controller of Thomas the Tank Engine, he explained. "And how is John Prescott?" quipped a voice from the ranks. "Always in our thoughts," came the reply.
• Finally, for all our misgivings, the trend towards outsourcing creeps its way through every area of national life. Today, the church. This from a notice sent to parishioners in the Hertfordshire town of Berkhamsted. "Beloved members of St Peter\'s, if you have an hour to spare one week in six, any day of the week, would you please help by being part of the cleaning rota (or send your domestic along)." It\'s the very latest thing: celestial brownie points by proxy. How the other half could save itself.
• This article was amended on 11 March 2010. The original used the name "10 Doughty Street". This has been corrected.
For more information, please visit
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/[...]ve-party-funding-lord-ashcroft
