VIDEO INTERVIEW with Lord Cruddas – on Rishi, Boris, Conservatism and whether he will ever donate again

Packed into less than 30 minutes are topics which could affect the Conservatives’ re-election hopes next year

Montage © Facts4EU.Org 2023

We present the video plus key excerpts from the Conservative Democratic Organisation’s President, Lord Peter Cruddas, and its Chairman, David Campbell Bannerman

One of the Conservative Party’s biggest donors says
“I would donate to the Conservative Party tomorrow if it reverted back to being a centre right party. If not, I don't see how personally I can donate to them. I can't do it.”

In an exclusive video interview for Brexit Facts4EU and CIBUK, the President and the Chairman of the Conservative Democratic Organisation (CDO) each speak out on issues which concern many members of the ruling Conservative Party, as well as on other topics of the day.

The Rt Hon Lord Peter Cruddas and former MEP David Campbell Bannerman talk about:

Sovereign nation democracy
Restoring true representation for Conservative Party members
Brexit
The Establishment Blob
Whether Rishi Sunak is a Conservative
How Boris Johnson has been treated
And whether the Conservative Party will ever again receive a donation from Lord Cruddas

Watch the video here :

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Brexit Facts4EU.Org Summary

Alternatively here are some key excerpts from the interview

The Rt Hon Lord Cruddas – Introduction:

“My name is Peter Cruddas. I'm a businessman, I'm a member of the House of Lords, I'm a paid-up member of the Conservative Party, and I have my own charitable foundation, the Peter Cruddas Foundation.”

David Campbell Bannerman – Introduction:

“I'm a former MEP for 10 years for the East of England, heavily involved in the Brexit referendum as previously Chairman and Deputy Leader of UKIP, have seen both parties and I've been involved in politics for about 35 years. I did a lot on trade models such as Super Canada, which is basically where we are today. So, trade is a big thing to me.”

Q: Lord Cruddas, let's start with the Conservative Democratic Organisation. Can you explain to us what the CDO is and why is it necessary?

Lord Cruddas:

“What happened last year was all the shenanigans around Boris's removal as Prime Minister. We came together because we felt that the Members’ voices should be heard and we felt that we wanted to have Boris Johnson on the ballot for a leadership campaign against whoever else the parliamentary party wanted to put up.

“What we discovered was that within the Constitution of the Conservative Party, if we got enough Members voting, then we could add Boris to the ballot and that was the basis of the creation of the Conservative Democratic Organisation. Just so that the Members could be properly represented and so their voices could be heard.”

David Campbell Bannerman:

“We felt there was a little democratic problem in the sense that Rishi Sunak, I'm afraid, that the way he was appointed, it is a real problem democratically. It's not personal to him. We're not anti-Rishi per se. But you know, two months after he was rejected by the Conservative Party membership, he was imposed – basically – by MPs on the members, without any confirmatory vote or anything. So, it again brought attention back to the problems with democracy and it just came to a head. Members were leaving in droves and we felt well, look, we've got to address this democratic hole.”

“Central Office is far too powerful. It's socially engineered. There's too many token candidates and the way to get it sorted out is to get back to the members, give local associations the full choice of candidates. All Central Office should be doing is to eliminate the bad, the mad and the sad.”

Lord Cruddas on the Conservative Party:

“We're not here to disrupt government. We're not here to oppose MPs per se. We genuinely think we're doing the right thing for the Conservative Party to get it back on track and to be and continue to be the most successful political party in the history of sovereign nation democracy.”

David Campbell Bannerman:

“We represent the whole party and it's important to defend sovereignty for the whole of the United Kingdom. CDO has representation in Northern Ireland. We have a regional director there and we want to stand in Northern Ireland properly. Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom and that really matters. We lost our way on that… we've got to rebuild that and also in Scotland and Wales. We are very pro-Union and we will have strong representation right across the UK.”

Lord Cruddas on Brexit:

“I was a co-founder of Vote Leave, and I fought Brexit on the front line. I don't believe that what the British people voted for has been delivered… This takes us back, I think, to the issues that we raised earlier about candidate selection. Seems to me there's been an engineering of the Conservative Party over the last 10 years to bring in pro-European sort of candidates and try and tip the balance towards a Remain type party.”

“Probably I would describe it today as centre left, and Boris came in and tried to drag us back to what he promised. What we promised at the 2016 referendum was voted for by a record number of people. What we're seeing with the Windsor Framework is another dilution of what the British people voted for back in 2016.”

“I don't think the Windsor Framework is a centre right policy. I don't think setting higher taxes are.”

Lord Cruddas on tax:

“I put this in my book, ‘Passport to Success’, because somebody has to pay for the country. But the reality is that the big conglomerates can move business around to different parts of the world and avoid paying higher corporation tax.

“It hits the small and medium sized enterprises in the country and I know that first hand, because when I was developing my business, the less tax you pay, the more people you can employ, the more you can invest.”

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Q: Is Rishi Sunak a Conservative Prime Minister?

Lord Cruddas :

“We've now been imposed with somebody that the Members didn't vote for. That's the point. It's not Rishi. It's not personal to Rishi. It's about the process and disenfranchising the members. And more importantly, the electorate.”

Lord Cruddas on Boris:

“Probably his life would be a lot better outside of politics. He would not struggle to find employment. But the issue here is the electorate. It's the electorate that have been treated appallingly by our party and that's unacceptable. The starting point to stop that happening again is to change the Constitution of the Conservative Party, so that Members have a much greater say with our parliamentarians and that is the whole point of the campaign for the Conservative Democratic Organisation. That's the whole point.”

David Campbell Bannerman on Boris:

“I think he's being appallingly treated. He got the largest majority, 80 seats, since Maggie Thatcher in 1987.”

Q: Is there any prospect of changing leader before the next election?

David Campbell Bannerman:

“Don't rule anything out. The polling is utterly disastrous at the moment for the Conservative Party. We’re about 30 points behind Labour and there doesn't seem to be any shift. I call it the Sunak slump. When Boris Johnson resigned, he mentioned that we were only 2% behind in the polls and now we're down to about 30%. And I think that is very, very significant and what's going to happen in my view is that Conservative MPs are going to panic, probably just after the local elections. And they're going to say how who's best to save my seat? They are ruthless. I think they'll actually look at getting Boris back because they know he's an election winner. So, it's possible, yes.”

Lord Cruddas:

“To me, what you're seeing today in political parties is the contempt that politicians, generally not specifically, hold for the British electorate. They've become so intoxicated with doing things and then pushing responsibility out to the European Union. This is what we want to do. And then, whoever the party leader, well, we can't change anything because we're in the European Union. What we're seeing today is just getting worse and it's why we should come out the European Union. We need to control our own country.”

Q : What about Brexit, David Campbell Bannerman?

“Brexit was about restoring sovereignty, self-government. That was the number one reason for Brexit. And what we're up against is a Remainer establishment that is doing everything possible, personally, legally, within Parliament or illegally, to stop it, and now Whitehall is doing everything possible to slow it down and overturn it, and the Protocol issue is all part of that, in my view. It keeps us far too closely entwined with EU rules.

“And we should break free but all of this comes back to who's in charge if the Members aren't being listened to in the political parties. It's Whitehall. It's the blob. The Establishment blob is in charge. That's why democracy really matters. You can get back control of the Conservative Party, have a real party reform. It will be listening to the Members and the Members listen to the public. They're part of the public, for heaven’s sake.”

Q : Concluding thoughts?

Lord Cruddas on the Conservative Democratic Organisation:

“What I would ask your listeners and viewers to do is that if they agree with what they've heard today is to join the Conservative Democratic Organisation and support us. You don't need to be a member of the Conservative Party. You can be a Democrat. You know we want to be embracing politically. So please sign up. Thank you.”

CDO President Lord Cruddas, Chairman David Campbell Bannerman, CEO Claire Bullivant

David Campbell Bannerman:

“And thank you for all the great work you do seven days a week. Facts4EU and CIBUK are very, very important.

“On the CDO, please look at www.conservativedems.co.uk. You can sign up. You can come to our conference on 13th of May in Bournemouth, sign up there. It's going to be great: Jacob Rees-Mogg, Priti Patel, Nadine Dorries and many others. Real Conservatives. You know, people that really care about the country with a lot of integrity will be coming.

“We're going to roll out our network, our new constitution and what we believe should be the future of our party. Please come along and get involved. It's the renewal of our party, it's a renaissance and it's very, very important. Thank you.”

Q : Lord Cruddas, if you don't get your way with the CDO’s aims then are you going to carry on supporting the Conservative Party financially?

“Well, I think it's up to the Conservative Party whether I support them. At the moment if they rang me up and asked me, I'd say no, because as a member I feel disenfranchised from the process of the way our leader was elected and the way the manifesto is being ignored by the current leadership.

“I'm still a loyal Conservative. If you look at my voting record in the House of Lords, I've voted 100% in favour of the Conservative government. I would donate to the Conservative Party tomorrow if it reverted back to being a centre right party. And unless they do that, then I don't see how personally I can donate to them. I can't do it.”

Observations

As ever we must point out that both Brexit Facts4EU.Org and CIBUK.Org are non-partisan. We present all views and leave readers and viewers to make up their own minds.

We felt that some interesting questions were raised by both Lord Cruddas and David Campbell Bannerman in this interview. For readers of a centre-right persuasion it’s clear that neither CDO’s President nor its Chairman believe that many of the Conservatives in Parliament represent the views of its members.

Parallels could of course be drawn with the Corbyn years for the Labour Party, where the grassroots across the country could not fathom the policies pursued by the leadership in Islington. Equally it is possible to say the same thing of the SNP in Scotland, where Nicola Sturgeon’s bizarre policies on the transgender issue alienated so many of the party’s membership, as well as its voter base.

Truly representative democracy is vital to the functioning of a society at ease with itself. A variety of political views will always exist, but must do so within a framework where people feel included. Perhaps we are going through a re-calibration across the country. The extent to which the political ‘elites’ understand the strength of this feeling will determine many political fortunes in the next two years, starting with the May local elections.

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[ Sources: Conservative Democratic Organisation | Lord Cruddas | David Campbell Bannerman ] Politicians and journalists can contact us for details, as ever.

Brexit Facts4EU.Org, Fri 24 Mar 2023

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Reader Comments 10

1. Jay Sparrow , Friday, March 24, 2023, 07:46:

"I would donate to the Conservative Party tomorrow if it reverted back to being a centre right party. And unless they do that, then I don't see how personally I can donate to them. I can't do it.”
Lord Cruddas, it's too late for a change of leader. Your vision and money would be much better invested in Reform UK, not in the Conservative Democratic Organisation.
Reform UK has already done much of the heavy lifting. It is small 'c' conservative with traditional values, a centre right party believing in the UK, the Family, SMEs.
Those Real Conservatives you mention would also find their natural home in Reform UK. David Campbell Bannerman, you also would be a great asset to Reform UK.

2. Have You Wondered , Friday, March 24, 2023, 09:07:

.
Can the Conservative Democratic Organisation regain UK democracy and survive Brussels?
.
Against the background that the UK , it can be argued, initiated modern democracy and justice that has been adopted over the world, today's signing of the Windsor Framework, that cannot be negotiated, marked the end of democracy (in particular the 2016 referendum) and I suggest the decomposition of the UK as a nation. How did 515 MP's disrespect the 2016 electorate referendum and overturn 17.4million, 51.89% votes to leave? Not Leave and leave bits behind. Not Leave and still be entangled in the EU web.
.
How would the Conservative Democratic Organisation turn all that around ? Would it be allowed to? How would the CDO navigate the inveigling Brussels regime?
.
As Bill Cash alludes to, if any party cannot play to the rules - all is lost. Why did Parliament walk over his sage words?
.
Wed 22 Mar 2023 vote opposed democracy that will, I suggest to all intents and purposes, suck the UK back into the EU, I expect, within 10yrs. Achieved by offering up Northern Ireland as the sacrificial lamb of the Union by an incompetent, some argue traitorous Westminster that will allow the EU to leverage the rest of the nation.
.
I suggest re-absorption will happen quickly as the EU will want to finally quell any other nations electorate (as distinct from politicians) having the nerve to oppose Brussels, to get the diverse wealth of the UK and kill off competition. By present EU vindictiveness, don't expect any concessions, the UK face will be rubbed in it as an example.
.
I hope Lord Cruddas and the Conservative Democratic Organisation can turn all that around.
.
Finally:
Do those 515 who voted in Parliament Wed 22 Mar 2023 recognise and remember all their (and our) past relatives lives lost fighting for democracy?
.

3. Sparky , Friday, March 24, 2023, 09:24:

Respect for Lord Cruddas, very successful business man.
However in the interview he criticises the undemocratic election of Rishi Sunak, how the party members didn't have a say. (after drawn out election of the disastrous Liz Truss who was elected by the party members the Cons weren't going to consult them again). He also promotes the Conservative Democratic Organisation.
The irony is obviously lost on him, Lord Cruddas was appointed a life peer by Johnson (slang version) despite contrary and unanimous advice by the House of Lords Appoints Commission. His Wikipedia page states that It was later reported that he donated £500,000 to the Conservative Party days after being elevated to the House of Lords. It also says it is believed he has donated £3m to the Cons party and also donated £50k to BJ leadership campaign
Shame he doesn't push for more honesty, truth and trust in UK politics.

4. Mike S , Friday, March 24, 2023, 10:01:

Have You Wondered, I completely agree, how do 515 politicians consider that what they think & want is of a higher significance over that of 17.4 million taxpaying voters?! If that isn't anti-the people, "me & mine first" mindset of the 515 British taxpaying voting backstabbers, I honestly don't know what is!
Sparky, you've put "honesty, truth & trust" into the same sentence as UK politics. How? The 4 absolutely do not belong in the same sentence together! The very fact that 515 so-called 'representatives' of the UK people consider that what THEY prefer is of superior importance to their wage payer's view proves that the 4 DO NOT go together! They're overturning this taxpaying electorate's vote, they'll just do it again & again & at some point, they'll do it for something, anything else in the future that you yourself actually do vote in favour of. There's very little point in going to the polling booth as it is but, once they deny democracy once, it will not end & the democracy we once lauded, is dead, if it isn't on life support already in the UK.

5. Gazzablack , Friday, March 24, 2023, 13:05:

Ooh look Sparky's back to referring to 'Johnson' with the suffix 'slang version'
That must make you feel sooo superior sparky.
.

6. Gazzablack , Friday, March 24, 2023, 14:25:

France is on fire
.
I blame Brexit

7. Gazzablack , Friday, March 24, 2023, 14:39:

Still trying to dictate to the Dutch.
.
Brussels has warned furious Dutch farmers that compulsory farm buyouts are still the only way for the Netherlands to meet it's EU climate targets.
.
Did any party in the Dutch coalition government include decimating the farm industry in their respective election manifestoes?

8. jon livesey , Friday, March 24, 2023, 14:53:

5. Gazzablack , Yes, and he still posting as if his opinions matter. Did I wake up this morning to discover what Sparky thinks of Lord Crudas? Nope. I am only interested in what is going to happen. Nothing much is going to happen based on what some Lefty thinks of some Tory donor. Facts matter. Opinions don't.

9. jon livesey , Friday, March 24, 2023, 15:34:

6. Gazzablack , : "France is on fire" Yes, postponing a Royal visit is so embarrassing that you know Macron is in some serious trouble.

10. Not4EU, London , Friday, March 24, 2023, 17:24:

An interesting interview which certainly nails many of the self-imposed problems of not just the con party, but the other parties as well. Sadly, the party is viewed as beyond redemption.
A leader and PM is 's'elected and imposed.
Candidates (apart from the old original tories) are 's'elected by cchq, parachuted in and imposed on constutuencies.
They have no loyalty to their constituents, & I would suggest that loyalty to this country is also questionable.
Why beyond redemption? The people see the continual betrayal.
Elected in 2010 with a key pledge of an EU referendum. Blamed that failure on their coalition partners. Scameron even called himself 'the heir to Blair'.
Elected with a majority (to make sure) in 2015. The majority took them by surprise but they campaigned to 'remain'.
Lost the referendum and spent years slow-walking watering down & sabotaging the vote to leave.
In 2019, an 80 seat majority with which they've done 'kall 'conservative' & continued to betray our democratic mandate. They failed to remove those blocking democracy, with just a few token 'deselections'.
This betrayal continues to this day.
Just how do we restore democracy & Parliament to represent the will of the people?
Voting demonstrably hasn't worked.
Petitions haven't worked.
Protesting hasn't worked.
What comes next?
If the CDO became a party in its own right, they might be worth a whirl, but the current existing party is viewed as owned by outside interests & as corrupt as ****. We've seen & heard all the good intentions and watched the betrayal continue.
Only 22 voting against the NI annexation, where NI fishermen now have to be treated as 'foreign' when they land their catch in their own country?
Do you really think that the parties are fixable AND you'll persuade the people? Start a new Conservative party. The old one is dead. It's just the libdems wearing blue badges. The trust is gone.

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