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The Campaign
"The Campaign for Conservative Democracy is a group of members of the Conservative
Party who believe
that our democracy is under threat and we must therefore, both defend and promote it
including within the
Conservative Party."
Although there have been major reforms within the Conservative Party in the last few
years, the Party is still
undemocratic. The true test of a democratic organisation is whether the
members of that organisation are
able to change the way the organisation governs itself on a basis of One Member, One Vote.
The
Conservative Party does not meet this test. A dozen MPs can block any major
change to the constitution.
We will continue to press for change.
In the meantime the Labour Government is changing the Nation's Constitution in many
ways. Our
democracy is under threat. Regional Government, House of Lords Reform, European
Parliament - in all these parts of our Constitution democracy is being ignored.
Chairman - John E. Strafford
Deputy Chairmen - Cllr.
Trevor Egleton
Cllr. Derek Tipp
Hon. Treasurer - Anne Egleton F.C.A.
Hon Secretary - Caroline Strafford
Management Committee - Cllr. Julia Long, Paul Kay, Jo Sommer, Cllr. Alan Glass, Mike Baker, Adrian Hilton, Stephen Parker.
CAMPAIGN FOR CONSERVATIVE DEMOCRACY
Minutes of the Annual General Meeting and Forum held on Saturday, 20th May 2006 at the Memorial Centre, East Common, Gerrards Cross at 11am.
Chairman’s Opening Remarks: The Chairman welcomed 36 members to the meeting.
Apologies for Absence: were received from 6 members.
Minutes of the last Annual General Meeting: held on Saturday, 20th May 2005 were agreed and signed by the Chairman.
Matters Arising: Nil.
Chairman’s Report: Six meetings had been held during the year plus a meeting at the Party Conference held jointly with the Charter Movement and the Campaign for UK Conservatism. Meetings discussed the General Election, the Party’s Constitution, Election of the Leader, the Armed Forces Bill, Conservative Policy Forum, English Standards Board, Political Correctness, Candidate Selection, European Peoples Party etc.
One of our meetings was held at the Colbury Memorial Hall. We held a barbecue in July and at some meetings we had a short talk on the History of Democracy.
The major campaign of the year was to oppose some of the changes to the Party’s Constitution and in particular the proposal to take away the members’ right to vote for the Leader of the Party. We won the campaign.
Hon. Treasurer’s Report: The figures showed COPOV had run at a deficit for the year. Main source of income had been the barbecue. COPOV was being run on a shoestring although donations were sought at each meeting to meet room hire expenses, postage and lunch. The treasurer was warmly thanked for keeping the books. The accounts were adopted. The auditor, Stephen Cox, was thanked for his work.
Membership Report: A report was given and it was pointed out that many people consider paying a donation similar to membership.
Elections: After formal proposals with seconders, the following were duly elected. Chairman – John Strafford, Deputy Chairman – Trevor Egleton and Cllr Derek Tipp, Hon. Treasurer – Anne Egleton FCA, Hon. Secretary – Caroline Strafford, Membership Secretary – Molly Andoe.
Management Committee: Cllr Julia Long, Paul Kay, Jo Sommer, Mike Baker and Cllr Allan Glass were elected. Two vacancies remain. The chairman thanked everyone who was re-elected for all their hard work. Good wishes for a speedy recovery were recorded for Allan Glass and Maureen Mallet.
Appointment of Auditors: Stephen Cox was re-elected and thanked for his past work.
Any Other Business: None.
Meeting formally closed: 11.20am after which a Forum took place.
CAMPAIGN FOR CONSERVATIVE DEMOCRACY
Minutes of the Annual General Meeting and Forum held on Saturday, 19th March 2005 at the Memorial Centre, East Common, Gerrards Cross at 11am.
Chairman’s Opening Remarks: The Chairman welcomed members to the meeting.
Apologies for Absence: were received from Molly Andoe and 12 members.
Minutes of the last Annual General Meeting: held on Saturday, 20th March 2004 were agreed and signed by the Chairman after noting in the Hon. Treasurer’s report that £458.00 was in the bank..
Matters Arising: Nil.
Chairman’s Report: Meetings had been held in May, July, September, November and January. Discussions had regularly been held on regionalisation at the meetings. PR, votes for prisoners, reform of the UN and American elections had been discussed together with electronic voting. Major activity through the year had been proposed changes to the Party’s Constitution and Rules for Leadership election. Reports had been then been submitted to Raymond Monbiot, Chairman of the Convention, and Simon Mort, also a Board Member, after COPOV members had made detailed proposals. In August a successful barbecue had been held at Perama, and at each meeting a short talk on the History of Democracy had taken place (time permitting.) One of our meetings had been held at Totton, Southampton. We knew big issue immediately after the General Election was going to be reform of the Party’s Constitution and referendum on Europe. COPOV must get involved in both issues, holding up the flag of democracy.
Hon. Treasurer’s Report: £368 was in the bank. Income from donations had been £160, and the barbecue had raised £139. Deficit on year of £234. There were 38 paid up members. Explanation was given about subscriptions and donations. The treasurer was warmly thanked for keeping the books. The accounts were adopted.
Membership Report: Support continues to grow around the country and official membership is 38.
Elections: After formal proposals with seconders, the following were duly elected. Chairman – John Strafford, Deputy Chairman – Trevor Egleton, Hon. Treasurer – Anne Egleton FCA, Hon. Secretary – Caroline Strafford, Membership Secretary – Molly Andoe.
Management Committee: Julia Long, Paul Kay, Jo Sommer, and Allan Glass were elected. Two vacancies remain. The chairman thanked everyone who was re-elected for all their hard work. Good wishes for a speedy recovery were recorded for Allan Glass and Maureen Mallet.
Appointment of Auditors: Stephen Cox was re-elected and thanked for his past work.
Any Other Business: None.
Meeting formally closed: 11.20am after which a Forum took place.
CAMPAIGN FOR CONSERVATIVE DEMOCRACY
HIGHLIGHTS
from
Minutes of the Annual General Meeting and Forum held on Saturday, 20th March 2004 at the Memorial Centre, East Common, Gerrards Cross at 11am.
Chairman’s Opening Remarks: The Chairman welcomed members to the meeting. Almost a year ago the country had been at war with Iraq.
Chairman’s Report: Meetings had been held in February, March, June, July and November 2003. Socials had included in March Bangers and Mash and Quiz at the home of Glenis and John Smith, and a Bar B Q in August at Perama which he hoped everyone enjoyed. Political matters discussed during the year included the draft Constitution for Europe, Iraq, globalisation, House of Lords Appointment Commission, issue of the Leader of the Party, regionalisation – thanks to regular reports from Trevor Egleton, Party organisation and State Funding of political parties. Media coverage for COPOV had been maintained, particularly at the time of dismissal of Iain Duncan Smith and election of Michael Howard, and earlier in the year during the War in Iraq. Particular success of the group had been over the Party agreeing for a referendum on the proposed European Constitution. COPOV had written to the Party Chairman about this and in January Michael Ancram had made it party policy. Other successes had been at the Spring Convention in Harrogate.
Re Northern Ireland – the Conservatives are beginning to get hope . The chairman had spoken to members of the Electoral Commission about the amounts of money being given to sitting MPs for research. Finally the chairman reported on the new and very encouraging positive feeling in the Party and stated that the recent Spring Convention in 2004 had been excellent..
Minutes of the Annual General Meeting and Forum held on Saturday, 3rd May 2003 at the Memorial Centre, East Common, Gerrards Cross at 11am.
Highlights:
Chairman’s Opening Remarks: The recent council elections had been a spectacular success for IDS and the Party had won nearly 600 seats. But results had been patchy and only 1 in 9 people had voted Conservative. It was reported that the Prime Minister had decided on a wholly elected House of Lords; elections in Northern Ireland had been postponed in May and were now postponed indefinitely; the country had been to war against Iraq as Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction – which had not been found – to give them democracy, but Iraq has to have a pluralistic state but in the UK we have state religion. Tony Blair was moving towards a European Constitution. Overall democracy as we know it remains under threat.
Chairman’s Report: Dolin Cummings of the Institute of Ideas had been speaker at last year’s AGM, and Forums had been held in May and September. A barbecue had taken place in July. James Elles MEP had addressed the November meeting about the European Convention and it had been decided to write and ask the Party for a referendum on this, and Michael Ancram had agreed this was to be the official Party policy. A submission had been made on State Funding to the Electoral Commission and Public Policy Research. In March an excellent social evening had been held at Glenis and John Smith’s with a clever political quiz set by the Egletons. The web site had been kept going throughout the year. The chairman thanked the deputy chairman, Trevor Egleton, hon. treasurer Anne Egleton, hon. secretary Caroline Strafford, membership secretary – Molly Andow, and the management committee of Julia Long, Paul Kay and Jo Sommer for their support.
Chairmans Report to the Annual General Meeting for the year ended 31st December 2001
2001 was a bad year for democracy. Terrorism reached new heights with the attack on the
United States on September 11.
We had a President of the USA elected on a minority of votes although he had a majority through the Electoral College system the USA has. We had the lowest turnout in a General Election in the UK since the major elector reforms of 1832 were enacted – 59.6%.
Democracy in the United Kingdom is under greater threat than ever before.
The highlights of COPOV during the year were the following:
In January we had a meeting on the European Constitution at which James Elles MEP was the guest speaker.
In February I represented COPOV at a meeting organised by the Electoral Reform Society at Portcullis House on "Political Parties and Representation".
After February we kept a low profile until after the General Election when in June we held a well attended meeting to discuss the Election which was put on BBC 9 O’Clock News.
We campaigned vigorously during the Leadership Election for the widest choice to be given to members. In a period of eight weeks I was on the "Today" programme six times.
We also campaigned for Motions to be debated at the Party Conference.
In September we held a meeting at which Well Phelan from Harvard University presented a Paper on the Leadership Campaign and Europe. This was quoted on the BBC website.
It was about this time that we heard of radical proposals to alter the entire structure of the Conservative Party. Due to the efforts of Justin North who wrote to all Conservative MPs, these were eventually squashed.
Finally in January we held a meeting and discussed House of Lords reform. We submitted our views to the Lord Chancellor.
I would like to thank the Deputy Chairmen, Officers and Management Committee and all those who submitted articles or E-mails for publication on the web site.
Our Patron, John Wilkinson MP, has continued to give us his support.
Chairman’s Report to the Annual General Meeting of C O P O V – For the year ended 31st December 2000
The threat to our democracy in the United Kingdom has intensified during the year. Local Authorities will now have to adopt either Mayoral Government or Cabinet Government with many Councillors taking on a diminished role. Unaccountable, unelected Regional Assemblies/Regional Development Authorities will next year spend £2.8billion.
Former terrorists participate in the power sharing government of Northern Ireland, Scotland is over represented at Westminster, with no answer as yet to the "West Lothian" question and the Welsh Assembly has proved to be toothless.
At Westminster the ability of the House of Commons to hold the Executive to account has been diminished by sign in voting where the MPs are not even present.
The House of Lords has become a House of Tony’s Cronies. One third of the current membership have been appointed by Tony Blair.
Of the three institutions that run the European Union the Commission is unelected, the European Parliament representation in the UK is elected by a closed list system of proportional representation and the Council of Ministers forms part of a pyramid of democracy.
The work of the Campaign for Conservative Democracy is more important today than it has ever been. I set out below the highlights of the year:
The web site has gone from strength to strength and generates a considerable amount of correspondence from all over the world.
Our success last year in getting the Conservative Party to publish its Accounts on the Party extranet site was not repeated. This year they have not done it.
At the Conservative National Forum in Harrogate we held a successful fringe meeting on "Democracy" and pressed hard for an elected Treasurer for the Conservative Party.
In July we held a very successful fund raising social evening at the home of Glenis and John Smith to whom we extend our grateful thanks.
September saw the first conference organised by COPOV. The speakers included Daniel Hannan MEP, Dominic Grieve MP, Jocelyn Ormond of the Bow Group and Cllr. Trevor Egleton – Leader of South Bucks District Council. All those attending expressed their appreciation and judged the conference a great success.
At the Party Conference in October the Chairman of COPOV spoke about Democracy in the session on the Constitution.
In January 2001 we held a successful half day meeting on "A European Constitution" at which our guest speaker was James Elles MEP.
Ours meetings have been well received and after the General Election we hope to resume them on a regular basis.
We have continued to campaign for justice regarding the Liverpool Garston Association. If the Party cannot treat its members in a fair and just way, then the future is indeed bleak.
Sadly during the year Steve Lorton, our Secretary, died, Steve was a great campaigner for democracy and we miss him. He was always a willing helper and strong supporter. On one occasion he travelled to Harrogate just to hand out leaflets.
Finally I would like to thank the Management Committee for all their work and in particular thanks are due to David Futcher, Anne Egleton and Molly Andoe for all their support and help.
I would also like to thank all those who have submitted articles or e-mails for publication on the web site. In particular may I thanks the "grass roots" Conservative for an excellent series of thought provoking articles which we have published throughout the year.
Our Patron, John Wilkinson MP, has continued to give us his support for which we are most grateful.
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| Members of COPOV enjoying the social evening (July 22nd) | The social evening (July 22nd - 2000) | Dominic Grieve MP at the COPOV Conference
23rd September - 2000.
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Daniel Hannan MEPat the COPOV conference 23rd September |
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| The Chairmanof COPOV being interviewed
by Polly Billington of BBC's "On the Record" at the Party Conference. |
The Chairman of COPOV addresses the Party Conference 2nd October |