To celebrate Conservative history week, those new media bods over at CCHQ have produces this excellent video to highlight the parties greatest achievements.

For those of you who want to take a slice of party history with you wherever you go, you can now download some excellent mobile phone ringtones from the new history section of the parties website. Unfortunately there is only two to choice from at the minute, ether Margaret Thatcher’s “The lady’s not for turning” or an excerpt from Winston Churchill’s “We shall fight on the beaches” speech. Hopefully Craig Elder and team will add more over time.

With the end of silly season now in sight, it’s time to take a look back at what you’ve made the most popular stories on Tory Politico. August may be a quieter time in Westminster, but this does not mean politics grinds to halt. This month we had Alan Scard putting his foot in it, Peter Hain backing hacker Gary McKinnon and Dr Sarah Wollaston winning the Tory Totnes open primary.

What decade is Alan Scard, Chairman of Gosport Conservative Association live in?
I only ask because, from comments he made on Channel 4 news, it would appear not to be this one. Asked in an the interview if he was happy to support David Cameron’s call to put more women in Parliament, he said: “If they are attractive yeah I would go for it.”

comprehensive schools shun tougher academic subjects.
If vindication of the Conservatives planned reforms of education and league tables was needed, look no further than today’s Telegraph and Independent. Both paper’s are reporting that a large minority of comprehensive schools are now shunning traditional academic subjects, such as maths, physics and history.

CCHQ: Bloggers are important.
Well it’s been a few day’s since I published my conversation with a press officer at CCHQ and by all accounts the proverbial hit the fan. And while it was unpleasant to hear a press officer say bloggers are not important, it appears that a victory has been won for bloggers who cover the Conservative Party.

Tory press officer: Blogs are not important.
Over the last 18 months or so the Conservative party has substantially increased the quality of their online presence, from nifty web 2.0 engagement drives to a mass of viral marketing activities. All of this I approve of, but when it comes to their press office engaging with independent, Conservative bloggers they leave a lot to be desired.

Health minister Ann Keen paid for staff to get private medical treatment.
Earlier today Tim Montgomerie reminded us of Gordon Brown’s “unpatriotic” use of private dental care. This jogged a memory lodged in the back of my mind about a story I had read during the MPs expenses scandal, concerning the Health minister Ann Keen.

Hain breaks ranks over Gary McKinnon.
Peter Hain has become the first member of the Cabinet to speak out against last Friday’s High Court ruling, condemned hacker Gary McKinnon to a trial in the US.

Dr Sarah Wollaston wins Tory Totnes primary.
The Totnes Open Primary, the first of its kind in the UK, has seen Dr Sarah Wollaston selected at the new conservative candidate to fight the coming election, on a 25% turnout. This is a much more than the 15% predicted by Eric Pickles.

67 percent of people say Labour has failed to improve education.
“Education, education, education” was how Tony Blair set out his priorities for office – as Labour campaigned to put classrooms at the top of the political agenda. 12 years on its clear that the majority of people now think Labour has failed to fulfill those lofty promises.

What to do with a problem called Mandy.
There is no question that the rehabilitation of Peter Mandelson and his return to government has been hugely beneficial to Gordon Brown.

Labour preparing for mass exodus at general election
If Gordon Brown thought the summer recess would allow things in Westminster to cool down, he was sorely wrong. Today’s Guardian reveal that as many as 120 Labour PM could stand-down from parliament at the next general election.

Im extremely grateful to all those readers that voted for me in Total Politics top political blogs poll. Earlier in the week Iain Dale published the magazines list of the top 100 right of centre blogs, in which I came in at number 90. Now Iain has blogged the results for the top 100 Conservative blogs, in this list Tory Politico does a hell of a lot better – coming in at number 45.

While on the surface this may seem to be a rather poor performance, it is, in reality rather good – after all TP has only been blogging for a short period of time.

Thank you so much to everyone who voted and congratulations to everyone else. The full list can be seen by clicking through to Total Politics but here is the top ten:

1. Iain Dale
2. Conservative Home
3. Dizzy Thinks
4. Daniel Hannan MEP
5. Tory Bear
6. Archbishop Cranmer
7. John Redwood MP
8. Douglas Carswell MP
9. Letters from a Tory
10. Burning our Money

One can only imagine what when through Alex Hilton’s mind when the shadow Home Secretary, Chris Grayling compared parts of Britain to the US drama, The Wire, set in the city of Baltimore.

While Hilton may have thought setting up a fake website, purporting to be from the real Mayor of Baltimore, was a good way of attacking Chris Grayling; it now looks like his little stunt could land him in real trouble.

In a statement released yesterday, the real Mayor Dixon said:

“The perpetrator of this crude joke has wasted the time and money of the city as well as the local and international media with this distraction. The city’s law department as well as the Mayor’s Office of Information Technology have been informed and are currently investigating this violation of the city’s website for copyright infringement.”

If, following their investigation, the authorities in Baltimore do find ground to prosecute Hilton, then this could have real impact over here. You see Hilton is not only a “leading” labour blogger, but also a PPC for the Chelsea and Fulham. While his chances of winning the seat are none existent, could the party really keep him as a candidate while he’s preparing to fight – or indeed fighting a court case in the US for copyright infringement.

So much for Labour cleaning up politics.

“Education, education, education” was how Tony Blair set out his priorities for office – as Labour campaigned to put classrooms at the top of the political agenda. 12 years on its clear that the majority of people now think Labour has failed to fulfill those lofty promises.

A new survey, carried out for Newsnight, has found that 67 percent of people now think the government has failed to deliver on Tony Blair’s pledge to put education at the top of its policy agenda. More than half of those who took part also said Labour has failed to improve the quality of the education system since coming to power n 1997.

“Although a record proportion of GCSE entries were awarded the top grades in this year’s exams, the results of the poll make difficult reading for the government with just 34% of those questioned saying that Labour had lived up to expectations on education, while 60% said that it had not.

There was large-scale uniformity in the answers of all age groups questioned, although the youngest age group were the least negative.

Overall 52% disagreed when asked if Labour have improved the overall quality of the education system since coming to power in 1997, while 41% said it had.

However, amongst those aged 18-24 just 36% disagreed and 55% said Labour had improved education.

When asked whether state education had got worse since Labour came into office in 1997 the overall split in opinion was much less, with 47% saying it had deteriorated and 43% saying it had not.

Again the group aged 18-24 were the least negative, with 48% saying that state education was not worse under Labour and 39% saying it was.”

Earlier in the week I wrote about the latest Guardian/ICM poll which showed the Conservatives now have a comfortable lead in nearly every policy area. That, coupled with these findings, will increase the pressure on those planning Gordon Brown’s “fight-cack.”

Last month Gordon Brown’s one and only strategy was to paint the Conservatives as the party that would cut services, while saying only Labour would invest. Now the Prime Minister has finally admitted he got it wrong. The Independent is reporting that he will publish a list of cuts, sometime before the coming elections, to tackle the growing dept mountain that he created.

According to Andrew Grice, the papers political editor, Brown’s new strategy will look something like this:

“Initially, Mr Brown will seek to establish in voters’ minds the key differences between Labour and the Tories – on policy, government intervention to limit the impact of the recession and preserving frontline services. Then he will acknowledge that the Government needs to go beyond the £35bn of efficiency savings it has already promised. The aim will be to show Labour is serious about reducing the deficit, which is set to rocket to £175bn in the current financial year and to £173bn next year.”

So what exactly will be for the chop under Brown’s cuts? This we don’t know yet, but there are some obvious projects that will be in the firing line.

First there’s the renewal for Trident. While Brown insists that he’s still committed to an independent nuclear deterrent, Labour has always been divided on the subject and saying he will slow the development of a Trident replacement could remove some pressure coming from the far-left of the party.

The paper also highlights the possibility of Gordon Brown and the Chancellor calling for Whitehall pay restraint and “belt-tightening.” Unlike the private sector, wagers within the public sector have bean insulated from the economic downturn to a large extent. But limiting pay awards for civil servant and insisting on “belt-tightening” does not go far enough. The only way to make meaningful savings in the civil service is to reduce its overall size, this should also include a reduction in the number of ministers.

While Team Brown are hoping the announcement of efficiency savings and cuts, along with the trumpeting of Labour’s “improvements” will be enough to revive his election hopes, their also pinning their hopes on an economic recover.

“Under the fightback plan, as the beginnings of economic recovery emerge, Labour hopes the Government’s actions will be seen to have stopped recession turning into depression. It says the next challenge for the party will be to demonstrate how recovery will be sustained, where the jobs of the future will come from and how investment in frontline services such as health, education and police will be safeguarded.”

As we know Brown is most comfortable when talking about the economy, but this is now a double edges sward for him – after all, it’s the economic policies that he introduced when in Number 11 that contributed to the collapse.

This also leaves a lot to chance, we may see a technical recovery in time for the next general election, but this is not the same as a recovery that people can feel and understand. Yes there could be an upturn and yes the recession may technically end, but for voters this means nothing. For them the recession will only end when friends and relatives stop losing their jobs and business begin to return to normal, this clearly is not going to happen in time for election.

Grice also highlights what he says is internal Labour polling which indicates that David Cameron is vulnerable on policy, with many people saying than the Tories have little or no policies.

This would seem to fly in the face of the latest Guardian/ICM poll which gives the Conservatives a good lead over Labour on health. 48% of people now think the NHS would be better under a Tory government, compared with only 41% saying it would be worse. Even 24% of current Labour voters think the Tories would improve the NHS. Clearly Labours ‘we love the NHS the most’ campaign of the last few weeks has failed miserably.

The NHS is not the only policy area where the Conservatives are how beating the government, indeed in nearly all areas the governments former lead has now turned into a deficit. On education the conservatives now have a four point lead and on the economy they now enjoy a healthy 11 point lead.

In his analysis of the poll the Guardian’s Julian Glover says:

“After a summer in which the economy appeared to get better and the Conservative leader had to make an emergency speech defending his support for the NHS, these figures will be disheartening to Labour. They suggest that the opposition has come close to “sealing the deal” with the electorate, in a phrase much bandied around at Westminster.”

So Our Dear Leader has spoken, but not about the scandal that’s seriously damaged the UK’s international reputation. Instead of speaking out about the release of a convicted terrorist, he thought writing a letter to the victorious English cricket team was a better use of his time. But he even managed to mess-up this simple task.

You would expect the Prime Minister to send a letter of congratulations in a timely manner, you would also expect his staff to make sure he was one of the fist to do so, but not this PM. 24 hours after the historic victory, Brown finally got around to sending a letter of congratulating the team a short time ago. Better late than never I guess – now how about saying something about the real issue of the day.

There will be little blogging during the day today as I have back to back client meetings, if I get a minute I will try and get something up if I get a chance. Normal service will resure this evening. Because of this I’m opening up the blog to guest posts for the first time, so if you want to get something published please make sure its no longer that 400 or 500 words, also include any external links as well as I will not have time to hunt them down.

I only ask because, from comments he made on Channel 4 news, it would appear not to be this one.

Asked in an the interview if he was happy to support David Cameron’s call to put more women in Parliament, he said: “If they are attractive yeah I would go for it.”

He added: “I suppose a woman…if they are attractive…I know it’s a sexist thing to say but you could get the blokes saying ‘Oh you know I would vote for her because she’s really attractive’ but then the other women say ‘Oh I don’t like her she’s too attractive.’”

If Mr Scard comments were not bad enough, he is currently in the process of selecting a would-be MP from a list of candidates approved by Tory headquarters to replace Sir Peter Viggers. As you will no doubt remember, Mr Viggers became a byword for abusing expenses, after the Daily Telegraphs revealed that he had claimed £1,645 in parliamentary expenses for a floating duck house.

David Cameron and party managers have worked hard no not only make the Conservative party more representative of modern Britain, but also to shed the traditional images of Tory MPs.

Cabinet Office minister Tessa Jowell has already come out and condemned Mr Scard comment saying:

“These comments which are deeply offensive and hugely patronising to women are exactly the type of Tory attitude David Cameron claims to have got rid of.”

While Mr Scard comments are clearly not representative of the party as a whole, this is the last thing Cameron and CCHQ wanted, a spokesman for the party said:

“These remarks were inappropriate and unacceptable, and Alan Scard has rightly apologised. David Cameron has made the selection of more women candidates a key priority of his leadership, and the Conservative Party is proud to be fielding more women candidates in winnable seats at the next election than ever before. They have all been selected on merit, just as the next candidate for Gosport will be.”

David Cameron has sent the following letter to Gordon Brown, demanding that he makes a statement regarding the release yesterday of Lockerbie bomber Abel Baset al-Megrahi.

“Dear Prime Minister,

The decision by the Scottish Justice Secreta y to release Mr al-Megrahi on compassionate grounds has been widely condemned, including by President Obama.

As I said yesterday, I believe that the decision to release Megrahi was wrong. He was convicted of murdering 270 people, and I do not believe he deserved to be released on compassionate grounds, or returned to Libya.

The scenes of him receiving a rapturous welcome at Tripoli airport on his return will have distressed many people. I note that Colonel Gaddafi’s son has now publicly thanked not just the Scottish authorities but the British Government for its stance, raising questions about the British Government’s role.

You have not commented on the decision since it was announced yesterday. This morning your Foreign Secretary refused several requests to say what he thought of the Scottish Justice Secretary’s decision.

The fact that the decision to release was taken by the Scottish Justice Secretary does not preclude you, as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, from now expressing your opinion on a subject that is of great public concern, and which affects Britain’s international reputation and our relations with our allies.

It is curious that while others have commented, Britain’s own Prime Minister has not.

I hope you will now take the opportunity to do so.

We are entitled to know what you and your Ministers have said to the Libyan authorities on this matter, and to the Scottish Justice Secretary.

Above all, I believe that the public are entitled to know what you think of the decision to release Megrahi, and whether you consider it was right or wrong.

I hope you will now take the opportunity to make your own view clear.

David Cameron.”

It is right that the UK Government distance itself the the SNPs decision, but the comments made by Alistair Darling following Megrahi’s release do not go far enough. Gordon Brown may thing that his silence achieves the effect of condemning the Scottish governments decision, but this is not the case. Brown’s silence speaks volumes about his inability to act decisively, just one of the personal trade that has dogged his premiership.

Hat Tip: ConHome