Senior Tory says, “Not the best campaign”

The Times highlights the organisational mess the Tories are in.  Cameron is refusing to get involved, while Steve Hiton, his director of strategy, is “concentrating instead on how to implement policies in government”.

A management consultant would have a field day with this:

George Osborne, the election coordinator, George Bridges, and Andy Coulson, the party’s communication chief, are running the campaign day-to-day.

Mr Bridges is dismissed as old-fashioned by youthful staff at the headquarters — a reference to his reliance on dossiers. Mr Coulson is blamed by some for pursuing short-term media coverage at the expense of a wider, coherent message, while Mr Hilton’s interest in the workings of a future Conservative government dismays those who want him to concentrate on delivering an election victory.

The Tories have had four years to settle on their strategy and to organise an election winning team.

Instead of behaving like a Prime Minister-in-waiting, we are now going to have Cameron asking the voters why they would want “another five more years of Gordon Brown”. 

Labour, of course, could easily turn this on its head by announcing: ‘Should we win there will be an orderly transition to a new leader in the next parliament’.

A senior source neatly sums were the Tories are:

Whatever we do we can’t be seen to be changing tack again. Whatever campaign we fight now is not the best campaign we could have fought but we have to choose one course and stick to it.

Let’s see if they do.