Cameron's Candidates? Primaries, the A-list and the way forward

Speakers

• Dave Skelton (Chair)
• Lord Adonis
• Sarah Wollaston MP (Invited)
• Christina Dykes
• Iain Dale

The Institute co-hosted fringe events at each of the three party conferences, where our panellists discussed the merits of recent reforms to candidate selection and reflected on the impact they have had on candidate diversity and public engagement.

Ahead of the 2010 General Election the Conservative Party experimented with different processes for choosing its parliamentary candidates, from David Cameron's A-list to primary elections in which all local voters could participate in the selection process.

For the party leadership, the objectives of these processes were to increase diversity and to encourage wider public participation. The results seemed positive: the number of female MPs rose from 17 to 49 and ethnic minority MPs increased from 2 to 11. And in the Totnes and Gosport primary elections, no fewer than 25% and 18% of voters participated in the Conservative candidate selection process. Yet these experiments proved controversial, creating tensions between local conservative associations and party headquarters.

Drawing on research by the Institute for Government, our expert panel discussed the advantages and drawbacks of the different selection methods used, and addressed the question of how the Conservative Party should pick its parliamentary candidates for the 2015 election.

Cameron's Candidates? Primaries, the A-list and the way forward was hosted by: Policy Exchange, CentreForum and Institute for Government.

More information

• See videos of this event
• What works in candidate selection? A discussion paper for the party conferences 2011
• Prime Time, by Andrew Adonis