Cleverly and Jenrick slam CCHQ machine

Who would want to work in Conservative Campaign Headquarters? The election this year was certainly not Tory high command’s finest hour, with rows over stitch-ups and misallocated resources neatly topping off the party’s worst election result in history. So with discontent high among both MPs and members, it is no surprise that Tory leadership contenders are lining up to criticise their own party establishment, according to a series of leaked recordings given to Mr S.

First up, Robert Jenrick, who is keen to present himself as the candidate most keen to overhaul the party machine. He wants to scrap the CCHQ-approved candidates’ list so that any member can stand and made his withering views clear when speaking to the Conservative Friends of the NHS group in August. ‘One of the first things we’re going to have to do is to radically reform CCHQ. It needs to be refounded, frankly’, he said before joking that he wouldn’t go so far as to ‘burn down CCHQ’, as one Tory member had suggested to him.