The Rock Blog

The whole NME have been working very hard since the election; today saw the first full meeting of the National Management Executive at CCHQ - future meetings will be taking place around the country.

As it was the first meeting we had a lot to discuss (pointed out by the fact the meeting ran for nearly 4 hours!) and plan. We made great ground, including sorting out the vacant Area Chairman positions, and are firmly ready to push ahead!

More details to come…

Click here for information on your NME.

As a political organisation it seems only right that we should help to educate our members about the forms of Government in the UK.

It would also give us the opportunity to engage a wider audience: there is no need to exclude non-CF members, it may even be a way to better engage a broader range of potential members.

The NME will therefore organise, with our Conservative elected politicians and staff, for tours of:

• Houses of Parliament
• Welsh Assembly
• Scottish Parliament
• Conservative Party Campaign Headquarters
• Other regional Party headquarters

These events will be separate to National Days and will be advertised on the CF website. It would only seem sensible to tie up these events with training or significant events that members may wish to attend.

I believe we should far better utilise and engage outside organisations with CF and these days, once planned properly and in advance, will provide us with the opportunity to offer a more diverse range of events.

After the last two hustings, it was hard to know what to expect: a respectful, attentive audience or a vocal, partisan audience. I think it was arguably a combination of both!

All the NME candidates were none affiliated and independent. Owen was his usual calm, collected self; Matt was honest, bright and earnest; Steve was passionate, heartfelt and British(!); Anastasia was brave, open and natural.

I think that Patrick Sullivan deserves a paragraph all to himself. I am sure many hundreds of Conservatives know Patrick. He has friends across the spectrum of the Party and CF and no doubt beyond. The speech Patrick gave tonight was possibly the bravest speech I have seen by an individual, young politician in my life. Patrick demonstrated everything I believe about internal politics: we should focus on the positives and not the negatives, we should aim higher,we should be better.

I have had tremendously positive feedback about my performance. As one person put it ‘a striking return to form’! I am happy that I can deliver my message and not only be complimented by my supporters but by people with commitments to other camps.

The evening had a positive, progressive tone that did all the candidates proud.