Result before vote as Tories 'elect' Hague

William Hague is taking a leaf out of Tony Blair's book to remodel the Conservative party along "one member, one vote" lines, writes Paul Routledge.

In a watershed speech to his party's MPs at Central Office on Wednesday, the new Tory leader will map out a process of democratisation for his party in a bid to rebuild popular support before the next election.

It will begin with a secret postal ballot of Conservative party members to give rank-and-file endorsement to the election of Mr Hague by the parliamentary party last month. Voting will take place in late September and the result - a foregone conclusion - will be announced at the annual conference in Blackpool in mid-October.

The Tories are clearly having some difficulties in coming to terms with internal party democracy. One source close to the leader admitted yesterday that the poll would be "rather Albanian".

One difficulty is that Conservative Central Office does not even know what size its membership is. Each constituency association will be asked how many members it has on its books, and will then be given sufficient ballot forms. Local parties will be "on their honour" to provide an accurate return.

In addition to voting for Mr Hague, party members will be asked to give their verdict on a number of reforms still being drawn up by Central Office.

One proposal will be for a national register of members, similar to Labour's, which could be used as the basis for future "one member, one vote" leadership elections. Another is for stronger controls for the leader over the choice of parliamentary candidates.