The only two people sacked from the Shadow Cabinet are Oliver Heald and Hugo Swire. Swire is a great friend of Cameron's. Last summer they holidayed together, so it must have taken some giant cojones to axe one of your best friends. The thing is, the only thing Hugo Swire got wrong was the museum charges announcement. It was hardly on the level of the grammar schools debacle, yet David Willetts survived.
Oliver Heald is a really nice guy and did nothing wrong, but didn't grab the headlines. His policy work was of the highest calibre but I suspect the addition of the Home Office issues to the portfolio meant that Cameron felt he needed someone there with a wider background. I have to admit I thought that Dominic Grieve would get this post. Much as I am delighted for Nick Herbert I fail to understand why Dominic still languishes outside the Shadow Cabinet.
Guido has been having some fun today asking whether Melissa Kite or I got the most Shadow cabinet guesses right. I'll leave you to work it out for yourselves. I do not want another war.
However, for the record I predicted the following...
*That the reshuffle would be early July, not May
*Michael Gove would be the new Minister for Schools
*Nick Herbert and Jeremy Hunt would join the Shadow Cabinet
*Caroline Spelman would be the new Party Chairman
*Grant Shapps would get a big promotion
*David Ruffley wouldn't
*Eric Pickles would get Local Government
*David Willetts would be moved, not sacked
*Oliver Heald would be dropped
But the ones I got wrong...
*Nothing for Dominic Grieve
*Alan Duncan didn't move
*Theresa May survived death row
*So did Peter Ainsworth
*I didn't think Hugo Swire would be sacked
Feel free to remind me of others I got wrong!
More analysis from Ben Brogan, The Spectator, Tim Montgomerie, Dizzy, Fraser Nelson & Nick Robinson. But where are Little & Large? Have they given up on blogging?
45 comments:
That clears up my question. My local MP, Heald, really doesn't do much except pose for rather silly photos in the local paper. Maybe seen as too old school for Cameron's young Tories.
I should have said that answers my question. hmmm.
whats happened to my favourite Tory Boris - dont say hes gone into the mists of time
You're prolific today, Mr D!
Boris is a vote winner. Dave is tone deaf. What can I say?
Also, Iain, he is using his sacking one of his best friends for grandstanding. "See how moral and impartial I am?" As you say, his museum charges annoucement was nowhere close on the Richter scale to Dave's own blundering around about grammars. Just like the posturing over the absurd, utterly reasonless sacking of Patrick Mercer.
Spin, spin, spin.
Iain, You Bitch!
Do we not need a Secretary of State for Portsmouth? Liverpool? Papua New Guinea? Cannibalism? Jamie Oliver? Graeco-Roman affairs? OK, just affairs?
I'm not at all sure Dave was taking this one at all seriously.
Iain you have gone far from this place to dwell in the Land of Nerd.
I cannot follow you and look forward to your return to "THE ISSUES"
Harumph
I suspect that Grieve is a victim of his own success - he hasn't been moved because he is so very very ogod at his job. You can see the temptation to leave him there!
Baroness Scotland is a politico-legal trainwreck waiting to happen, and so there's the potential for great and important headway to be made by a serious, heavyweight shadow AG.
I am also very disappointed, on both counts, to see Ed Vaizey miss out at the expense of Grant Shapps [I mean, really...!].
George Osborne Chancellor = Election Defeat
Have you forgotten that Grieve threw coals on the Grammar Schools fire, when he suggested that his constituency should also be allowed to expand its grammar School's population.
He's also an ugly, desiccated-looking creature, who doesn't look good on the tele. Like Letwyn, he's a useful,brainy bugger who should be kept out of sight in a back office somewhere.
I'm surprised and disappointed by Nick Robinson's analysis, which is quite frankly simple and childish. I'd be interested to know your thoughts on it, though.
Meanwhile, in the real world, the fall-out from the corrupt and truly wicked Iraq scandal has been highlighted again by President Bush's pardon for I Lewis "Scooter" Libby, who was Cheney's bagman and fall guy over the Valerie Plame affair.
Will Gordon Brown do likewise when Lord Cashpoint does the perp walk over cash for honours? Will Tony Blair ever be prosecuted for lying to Parliament?
Dominic Grieve: image. Screams toff.
Private polling shows people dont want an Etonian Govt.
Swire Out.
End of story Iain.
Iain I am not that interested in this but what I would like to know is what would the Conservatives would do about these Islamic terrorists within our country.
Johnny Norfolk - yes.
Edward said...
I'm surprised and disappointed by Nick Robinson's analysis, which is quite frankly simple and childish. I'd be interested to know your thoughts on it, though.
What mine? Well I'm flattered,and quite honestly humbled.Bless you guv.
verity said...
Johnny Norfolk - yes.
Excellent posting Verity.Brief,very.
Johnny Norfolk said...
Iain I am not that interested in this but what I would like to know is what would the Conservatives would do about these Islamic terrorists within our country.
Support Gordon I would hope,wouldn't you ?
bebopper is right. After Grieve's stirring over grammars I'm amazed various Tory bloggers thought he'd get promoted
Maybe Boris is playing a long game. In his shoes I wouldn't want to be associated with this unprincipled/unpolicied/unelectable bunch of 'soon to be losers' (if Brown has the nerve to call a quickish election).
Then, Bingo - or Boris to be more precise.
I would like to know is what would the Conservatives would do about these Islamic terrorists within our country.
Probably ask them to wear green it is an Islamic colour....
It was the Tories who brough Islamic groups to London in the 1980s and 1990s and they did reduce our immigration staff and start the disastrous computerisation at Croydon.
Frankly none of the political parties has really protected the public from terrorists, they have all done backroom deals and eaten the canapees at Saudi-sponsored love-ins to promote the wonders of islam to a sceptical public.
Faith in politicians is a sure way to sign your own death warrant. This is but another chapter in the unravelling of the British state and the disintegration of political parties........the future will be a different place
Dave and grassroots.(ConsHome)Suggest everyone reads the RIV post 3/7/07 02.41.So close to the truth-IT HURTS!
(wonderfulforhisage)As someone said the other day it would be act of Christian charity if Brown called an early election and brought the Tory party's ever deepening misery to an end.
Re: Silas Cratchit
What a hisey fit that was(!). Get over it, I mean really it was five years ago. There was nothing corrupt or wicked about it. The appeasement brigade lost the debate. Scooter Libby's conviction was highly questionable and the sentence was a joke. I am glad the President intervened.
Find another subject, this one's boring.
The boy Gove is given Schools. Cameron has a delicious sense of humour.
Nothing for Grieve!? He's easily the best of the bunch.
who won,Dale or Kite
Was Grieve punished for his Grammar school comments?
Just for the hell of it, had a little peruse at Caroline Spelmens Members Interests, and voting habits. Very interesting. Seems that she is very strongly ""against"" equal gay rights, pro fox hunting, pro Iraq war; not exactly a good bag of qualities.
More interesting she doesn’t seem to have declared the £10,000 that the Midland Industrial Council gave her to aid her 2005 election campaign.
We all love Boris, even I enjoy his many appearances on TV and Radio. However he is a buffoon and a classic gaffe prone floppy haired toff. We like him because he is entertaining and some times controversial. But would you honestly give such a person a role of responsibility… God No !!!.
This reshuffle is like shaking jelly. A lot moves around but when it all stops there is no more backbone than when it strated.
A reshuffle was a good idea, but Dave needs his head examining for doing it yesterday when it was buried by all the terrorism news. He's clearly missed a chance to get some free publicity, and I'd bet that most people are simply unaware that the reshuffle happened at all.
Francis Maude's work ethic is apparently a forbidden subject on this blog.
someone said...
A reshuffle was a good idea, but Dave needs his head examining for doing it yesterday when it was buried by all the terrorism news. He's clearly missed a chance to get some free publicity, and I'd bet that most people are simply unaware that the reshuffle happened at all.
July 03, 2007 10:39 AM
WASNT THAT THE WHOLE REASON FOR DOING IT YESTERDAY. BURYING BAD NEWS
Thanks to the BMA recruitment process that discriminates against our own doctors, we now have Islamic terrorists working in our hospitals. Absolutely no politician has had the courage to comment on this scandal.
What a pointless exercise. Where oh where was Alan Duncan, Boris Johnson, Anne Milton, Nadine Dorries and Adam Afriye? A better promotion for Chris Grayling would have been good too.Why oh why was not Hague installed as shadow chancellor? What on earth is going on? The Lady was right on her comment 'people come in to politics to be something rather than to DO something'. I wonder whether she will give us her full opinion on DC....
The grammar school debacle was far worse than the museum charges debacle, but since it was mainly of Cameron's direct doing punishing Willets more harshly for it would have been wrong.
It does seem that the reshuffle has been largely based on how many column inches people have achieved rather than on ideas. Perhaps, since we don't know how well they would run departments this is inevitable but the advantage of opposition is that it gives you time to come up with ideas.
Cameron has agreed not to rock the boat over the terrorist outrages and will simply rubber-stamp whatever Gordon wants to do and say. Like Gordon, he's not allowed to condemn the terrorists because they're Muslims so he has to confine himself to praising the police and the security services.
I think I would advise the National Front, Justice4Fathers, Welsh Nationalists and An Gof to start bombing. They'll get loads of publicity for their causes and now that the precedent has been set no-one will dare to say a word against them.
And if Dave has agreed to be gagged over the bombs why has he not been to visit the flood victims instead? I bet if the floods were in Bangladesh the Press, the BBC and poliocitians would ensure that we'd never hear the end of it.
As someone who openly admits to being passionate about the Conservative Party and its demise, I have to say that your little bit of shufflung in the ranks did absolutely nothing.
The same mug shots will fill our screens when the balloon goes up around Britain, Europe and the rest of the world.
I doubt very much that Willets and Maude got it wrong, they are just modern Tories in a Global world.
OK, Dave is the front man with a nice smile and personality (who wrote your last manifesto)but Hague and Osborne are the real culprits in your slide.
When we 'THE GREAT BRITISH PUBLIC' see these clowns performing in the ring, we see a CON job being played out.
Nobody'd fooled; it's Brown all the way and caning for you soon enough.Portillo gets it mostly right and Osbornism is yesterdays politics.
It's May by the way.
Nick Robinson's Blog appears to be closed to comments of any kind so I suppose it is now a monoblog?
Attempt to post a reply and you will get a screen that says in order to prevent spammers you are not allowed to post again until a certian time has elapsed. In my case a delay from Thursday to Tuesday was insufficient! But I don't see any other replies to his more recent blogs.
What caused me be bothered? I wanted to tell him that his blog about how Cameron had ordered his new cabinet was hardly up to standard.
I have seen Patrick Mercer several times recently on TV talking about security. It seems that Dave let one of the good ones go.
Victor
http://conservativemindblog.blogspot.com/2007/07/quote-of-day-372007.html
Ha! Ha!
I quote from above: "I think I would advise the National Front, Justice4Fathers, Welsh Nationalists and An Gof to start bombing."
I think I would advise you (Desperate Dan) that that would be a criminal offence. Indeed, posting it on here might well already be one. They can trace anonymous posts you know.
As a constituent it struck me as rather foolish to suggest that Heald was dropped because the brief was widened with Home Office issues since he spent time working in the Home Affairs Team a few years ago.
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