Tuesday, September 19, 2006
CF - new exec new dawn?
... and so a month of tireless campaigning came to an end with Mark Clarke elected Chairman for Conservative Future and almost an entirely new National Management Executive. Aberystwyth Conservative Future congratulates all those elected to serve CF for the forthcoming year.
In hindsight you may view it as I do that the results providing us with so many fresh faces were hardly suprising - apart from a shock that a very hard working and credible candidate who served last year, Jonathon Ash-Edwards failed to secure enough votes to serve us again. In recent years it has been obvious that CF nationally has failed to capitalise on the potential that exists. Turnout was about double compared to last year (still only a mere 700) and the count was closer than expected.
As North Wales Area Chairman and Aberystwyth Branch Chairman for CF I backed Mark Clarke because he stood out from the crowd, he was willing to take an interest in Wales, Welsh politics and the differences we have with our English counterparts. Differences in membership, resources, finance and an established area structure. He could see there was a point in doing more than the odd journey up the M4 corridor and meeting face to face rather than by messenger or video-conferencing. I feel it is that people dont vote in CF elections because they don't know who the candidates are and they barely influence the average member . Have branches become to localised and isolated? Branches should be more open. Are they failing to realise what influence their members can make nationally?
Conservative Future can only benefit from Mark Clarke's approach, setting up branches in target seats is a key for the assembly and parliamentary elections. Myself and other area chairmen backed Mark as we feel that the party as a whole should benefit from CF and not the individual.
In the coming months we must unite rather than divide to ensure that suitable candidates can fill the vacant area chair positions across the country so that we can become a coherent movement we can be proud of. Competence and hard work is essential over the coming year and I believe under the new leadership and our new image we can succeed to assembly success in May.
In hindsight you may view it as I do that the results providing us with so many fresh faces were hardly suprising - apart from a shock that a very hard working and credible candidate who served last year, Jonathon Ash-Edwards failed to secure enough votes to serve us again. In recent years it has been obvious that CF nationally has failed to capitalise on the potential that exists. Turnout was about double compared to last year (still only a mere 700) and the count was closer than expected.
As North Wales Area Chairman and Aberystwyth Branch Chairman for CF I backed Mark Clarke because he stood out from the crowd, he was willing to take an interest in Wales, Welsh politics and the differences we have with our English counterparts. Differences in membership, resources, finance and an established area structure. He could see there was a point in doing more than the odd journey up the M4 corridor and meeting face to face rather than by messenger or video-conferencing. I feel it is that people dont vote in CF elections because they don't know who the candidates are and they barely influence the average member . Have branches become to localised and isolated? Branches should be more open. Are they failing to realise what influence their members can make nationally?
Conservative Future can only benefit from Mark Clarke's approach, setting up branches in target seats is a key for the assembly and parliamentary elections. Myself and other area chairmen backed Mark as we feel that the party as a whole should benefit from CF and not the individual.
In the coming months we must unite rather than divide to ensure that suitable candidates can fill the vacant area chair positions across the country so that we can become a coherent movement we can be proud of. Competence and hard work is essential over the coming year and I believe under the new leadership and our new image we can succeed to assembly success in May.
# posted by Paul Rogers @ 8:32 pm 
