Lynton Crosby gives Tories 'lovely' roasting as MPs demand govt EU referendum bill

The Conservatives have just held a party meeting where Lynton Crosby was supposed to be reading them the riot act over their behaviour in the past few weeks. But the MPs leaving seemed to think it was ‘lovely’, ‘very positive’ and ‘all very tame’, which sounds like an unconventional roasting. The meeting focused on turning technical achievements into an emotional message and strategy for the European elections. The latter includes listing where the Conservatives have already delivered: on the EU budget, the veto and cutting bailouts, which should be proof enough that the Conservatives can deliver more.

Apparently the Prime Minister and George Osborne said nothing. It will be interesting to see whether this ‘roasting’ makes any difference to party discipline: Crosby has been successful in cheering up a number of backbenchers who were very grumpy about the way things were going through a combination of message discipline and swearing at the party.