Crammed into a steamy corner of The Spectator’s Westminster office, Liz Truss warned her colleagues on the Conservative right that they were losing the battle for the party’s future.
The former Prime Minister, who hosted the launch of her book Ten Days to Save the West, argued that the selection of the next generation of Conservative MPs was being warped by wokery, and that political correctness took priority over Conservative political ideology.
And according to a whistleblower who contacted The Mail on Sunday, Ms Truss is right: the source said the process slavishly followed ‘The Script’ imposed by the party, which was ‘a box-ticking exercise more concerned with pointing out virtues than to find corresponding deputies”.
Liz Truss speaks to Glen Owen about her new book in September 2023. She has now argued that the selection of the next generation of Conservative MPs is being warped by wokeness.
Three days after the event, in the book-filled atmosphere of the nearby Cinnamon Club restaurant, one of Truss’s former lieutenants set out his vision for how the Conservatives should rebuild after the expected annihilation in the general election, and made it clear that so was. I don’t see a leading role for Mrs. Truss.
Mark Littlewood, former director-general of the Institute of Economic Affairs think tank, whose peerage nomination in Truss’s resignation honors list was mysteriously blocked, was trying to tempt potential allies to join his new group, Popular Conservatism – known as PopCon – which aims to “Unite the Right” of UK politics.
As waiters served high-quality Indian food, Littlewood discussed the topic on every Tory’s lips: who would succeed Rishi Sunak when he is ousted by panicked MPs or defenestrated by the electorate.
Littlewood is pushing the ’70/70/70,000 strategy’: there are approximately 70 weeks until a new leader arrives, 70 MPs are needed to back them and 70,000 Conservative party members must be converted to the PopCon cause.
While the group has yet to agree on a leadership candidate (apart from the fact that the British public will never trust Ms Truss again), Priti Patel, Suella Braverman and Robert Jenrick are the main names in the mix , possibly as part of a formal meeting. “Alliance” with Nigel Farage’s Reform UK. Littlewood privately boasts of having raised a quarter of a million pounds and has held talks with his former think tank colleagues about joining the movement.
Billionaire Michael Hintze is among powerful donors who sources say have been asked to give money directly to selected Conservative MPs, bypassing the usual pre-election channel at Conservative Party Headquarters (CCHQ). There is also talk of a list of about 40 “real” names presented to donors.
“They need to shoot down the One Nation wing of the party, gut them,” said a source familiar with the list, referring to the moderate Conservatives.
While the source admits that the latest terrible polling means Littlewood’s ’70/70′ figures are now closer to 50 weeks and 50 MPs, they are teaming up with friendly Conservative associations across the country to create a mailing list of conservative members.
Some of the same donors who are under attack gathered last week at Syon House, on the 16th-century Syon Park estate on the outskirts of west London, for a gala dinner with the Prime Minister. Hosted by the Duke and Duchess of Northumberland, 50 donors heard Mr Sunak give a speech before chatting at tables, which cost £5,000 to enter.
Rishi Sunak gives a speech on welfare reform on Friday. He is described as a pragmatist and a technocrat rather than a reformer with a vision.
One of those present said: ‘The Prime Minister made the usual speech about cuts to National Insurance. Sunak is more of a pragmatist and technocrat than a reformer with a vision. When at a party conference he said he wanted to reform A-levels and ban smoking, I thought: “You haven’t got a political bone in your body.” The Conservatives have had enough of this centre-left nonsense.’
Ms Truss is defending a seemingly unassailable majority of more than 26,000 in her seat in south-west Norfolk, so she hopes to be in a position to join PopCon to help reshape the right. But she faces the threat of a local independent candidate who is trying to bring about the ultimate indignity of her by unseating her in the election. If she survives, she will campaign to change the way the party now selects MPs.
The whistleblower told this newspaper that those involved in selecting potential Conservative MPs are expected to follow ‘The Script’, a list of questions devised by CCHQ that does not mention policies or issues such as Brexit: instead, the section with the most questions is titled “Diversity of Thought and Action,” as well as questions on “self-awareness” and “social awareness.” Only three questions in the 110-minute interview process cover political conviction. They include: “Which conservative policy presents the biggest challenge to you and why?” and ‘How would you balance your personal beliefs with the requirement to support the Government?’
Candidates are then asked questions about “building diverse teams” and “how they would best implement diversity of thought and action in the future,” as well as how they deal with “personal criticism” and “great pressure.”
Liz Truss’s book, Ten Days to Save the West. Her former lieutenants believe the British public will never trust her again after her disastrous tenure as prime minister.
The source told The Mail on Sunday: ‘At the moment there is no policy in place to test people’s political conviction. Anyone could pass. You could be a raging communist and get through the process, as long as you hadn’t stood as a Labor candidate. You could cheat the system.
“It’s all part of a sinister plot to reshape the party since Cameron’s time. There are forces at play that over the last five years have tried to annihilate the centre-right. They are empowered people who are centre-left within the Conservative Party.”
The source added that the “old way of doing things” was more effective in finding true conservatives. ‘Fifteen or twenty years ago, you would invite someone to have a few drinks, you would get to know them and then you would say: do you want to go into politics? Why don’t you come and take my seat? It was not democratic but it worked.”
Another source blamed the Downing Street machinery for being “a major part of the problem”.
One insider said: “There’s no point even going to them – they’re such a lazy bunch.”
A PopCon source said there are no plans for an alliance with Reform before the election.
A Conservative Party spokesperson said: ‘We selected a range of candidates from across the country from all types of backgrounds. We are completely confident that our process selects the most suitable candidates and offers associations a wide variety of options. Obviously some people will be disappointed if they are not selected, but it is a highly competitive process.’