A charity managed by one of the Conservatives’ top parliamentary candidates is facing scrutiny by regulators after accounts indicated massively disproportionate back-office costs and a failure to account for nearly £16,000.

Shaun Bailey, the Tory candidate for Hammersmith, is the Managing Director of My Generation, apparently set up to “alleviate social and economic disadvantage”. The accounts for years ending 2007, 2008 and 2009 make grim reading for donors, whose money appears to be massively wasted on “management and administration” and “fundraising and publicity”:

It seems Bailey wouldn’t know voluntary sector best practice if it jumped up and said “marginal constituency”. CharityFacts was founded by Professor Adrian Sargeant of Bristol Business School and supported by the RSPCA, the NSPCC, Cancer Research UK and the British Red Cross:

We would normally have concerns about a charity spending more than 15% of its income on administration. Such charities we would ask to justify their level of expense. – CharityFacts

Fifteen percent, eh? My Generation’s 2007-2008 accounts show that nearly 19 in every 20 pounds spent that year under Bailey’s management was blown on back-office expenses and promotion (Bailey himself features heavily in their materials). The small blue segment at the top of the chart below designates “direct charitable expenditure”:

Having spent a mere 44% on administration in the last year for which accounts are available, Bailey might well claim that the charity has improved in this regard. However this is still way above what would be expected and, as a report by independent examiner’s report notes, there are ”£15,952 of payments without any supporting records”.

Scrapbook is not in the business of attacking charities for no reason but My Generation is absolutely integral to Brand Bailey. What’s the first sentence in his candidate biography?

While it may perform some good works, there is no doubt that this operation is a plank in a broader PR offensive by Conservative candidates. As The Times notes:

“Both [Joanne Cash and Shaun Bailey] are seen as pioneers of Mr Cameron’s plan to rebuild communities through self-help initiatives. The party claims its candidates have begun 150 such projects, although, when contacted, officials could cite only five.”

Blogger Ivan Pope has an excellent post on these charity-cum-political activities, written around the time Bailey was selected. In May 2007, our protagonist was bragging to the Guardian about his do-goodery. But digging done by Pope at this time indicate that that My Generation had no website and seemed only to have been discussed in the context of Shaun Bailey’s political career.

The company vehicle used for the charity had only been renamed from “The Policy Alliance” months before, around the time Bailey started jockeying for the Hammersmith selection. What a remarkable coincidence!

More to come on this one.

UPDATE 16:10 Just received the following from a reader who would rather remain anonymous: “I did an event with Bailey recently. It turned into him just promoting himself”!

Share With Friends

There have been some engrossing accounts of the last 48 hour’s internecine warfare in Westminster North from Iain Martin and Paul Waugh. The detail that jumped out at Scrapbook, however, was this from Andy McSmith at the Independent:

The sense of crisis was heightened by the appearance of two members of the Shadow Cabinet: the party chairman, Eric Pickles, in support of Ms Cash, and Lord Strathclyde, a Westminster resident and the Tory leader in the House of Lords, reported to have sided with Mrs Sayers.

An A-list uber-Cameroon throwing a strop and trying to resign less than three months before an election is one thing. Two cabinet ministers decamping to the constituency to take sides is another.

This incident may yet become a key point of reference in the story of Cameron’s effort to wrest control from, in Joanne Cash’s words, “dinosaur” elements of the party. And this tale may not end well for Cash, whose inner circle status and desire for “total victory” in this spat may make her a target for traditionalists.

You honestly couldn’t make it up.

Share With Friends

UPDATE 18:32 The line is “Westminster North Conservative Association has not accepted Joanne Cash’s resignation. CCHQ is working to resolve issues”. This is a very interesting wording: “we’re not accepting her resignation” is not the same as “I’m not resigning”.

UPDATE 18:09 Tory Bear reports that she won’t be resigning (after all) and a statement is imminent.

The Tories still haven’t resolved the issue of Joanne Cash’s candidacy in Westminster North. Channel 4′s Cathy Newman isn’t the only one who thinks it’s ridiculous:

Someone, whether Cash herself or figures within her local party, have created a gigantic distraction and the Tory press operation seems to be completely floundering.

1. Why did Joanne Cash resign in the first place?
2. What was the nature of today’s wrangling between Cash, CCHQ and Westminster North Conservative Association?
3. Has she now been re-instated as the PPC?

The slow response (it seems they can’t even sate lobby hacks with a vaguely accurate off-the-record briefing) is somewhat ironic given their claimed fleetness of foot over expenses in the past week.

Nature abhors a vacuum – and so does politics.

Share With Friends

Speculation was rife last night that the pregnancy of Tory Joanne Cash was a factor in her being “forced out” as Conservative candidate in the crucial target seat of Westminster North. Reading the following excerpt from a Times article, however, is it surprising yesterday’s crisis meeting was attended by both Eric Pickles and Lord Strathclyde?

Another one to watch is Joanne Cash, the candidate for Westminster North. If Cash, a barrister specialising in media law, is elected she will arrive with a contacts book to die for. At her wedding last year to Octavius Black, the founder of the Mind Gym consultancy, Michael Gove, the Tory schools spokesman, gave the main speech.

Other guests included Andy Coulson, Cameron’s director of communications. Cash lives in Notting Hill, west London, yards from the home of George Osborne, the shadow chancellor. As well as being an assiduous social networker, the Oxford-educated Cash is a policy junkie, advising the front bench on legal issues.

The rumour mill has been working overtime in the last 17 hours. ConservativeHome reported before 10pm that the Tory top brass were “mounting effort to reverse [the] decision” while Tory Radio heard whisper this afternoon that she may be back in place as PPC by the end of the day. The Daily Mail, however, suggests tensions may have arisen over the appointment of local party officers, rather than Cash’s pregnancy; Paul Waugh notes a rather cryptic bio entry on her Twitter account – did Westminster North members take offence?

Either way, this won’t look good to voters less than three months before the election.

Will be interesting as to how they explain this one.

Share With Friends

CCHQ were left scrambling to save one of their star candidates this evening amidst allegations that she was forced out by local party members. Joanne Cash, the Tories’ PPC in the key target of Westminster North, resigned at an emergency meeting of the local Conservative Association attended by party chairman Eric Pickles and Lords leader Tom Strathclyde.

This blow to David Cameron’s efforts to select more female candidates comes after Liz Truss, the Tories’ candidate in South West Norfolk, survived a concerted deselection attempt after she failed to inform the local party that she (shock! horror!) had an affair a mere four years previously. Former Observer political editor Gabby Hinsliff has suggested Cash has faced difficulties with her local party after becoming pregnant.

Same old Tories.

Share With Friends