Chequers anger leads to surge in Tory membership

New members join ‘to vote in leadership election’ after Brexit agreement proves unpopular with grass roots

CONSERVATIVE Party associations are reporting a surge in members who have joined in the wake of Theresa May’s Chequers deal, which has proved unpopular with the grass roots.

The increase in membership will raise concerns that the party is at risk from a “blue Momentum” takeover among supporters furious with the deal, which keeps Britain closely tied to the European Union after Brexit.

John Strafford, a leading Tory grassroots campaigner, said the rise came from former Ukip members who were rejoining because they did not like the deal and wanted to vote in a leadership contest to replace Mrs May.

Conservative Party rules mean anyone who has been a member for more than three months can vote in a leadership contest.

Boris Johnson, who resigned as foreign secretary over the Chequers deal, today reinforces his opposition to it, writing in The Daily Telegraph that it is time to “chuck Chequers”.

A survey by The Sunday Times found that more than half of grassroots Tory party associations have been flooded with new members, many to oppose Mrs May’s plans for Brexit.

In the survey, 42 out of 75 local associations reported that they had seen increases in membership, with many noting a change since the Chequers deal was agreed by the Cabinet.

Mrs May and 11 other Cabinet attendees saw an increase in membership in their local parties. Only two of the 12 voted to leave the EU.

Michael Gove’s Surrey Heath constituency has had an increase of 40 members, while Damian Hinds’s East Hampshire association saw membership jump by 42.

Increases were likely “where the MPS were for Remain but constituencies voted to Leave”.

Arron Banks, the businessman who helped fund the Leave campaign, is launching a drive to get Eurosceptic voters to join the Tories to block the deal and oust Mrs May.

Mr Strafford, the chairman of the Campaign for Conservative Democracy, has privately told Brandon Lewis, the Conservative Party chairman, that the new activists want to take part in the next leadership election.

In the letter, which has been seen by The Daily Telegraph, Mr Stafford told Mr Lewis it was “not acceptable” that in 2003 and 2016 the party’s leader was not elected by members.

He said: “It is time for the party to embrace democracy and allow full participation by the membership.”

Mr Strafford proposed that the party’s ruling 1922 Committee would “now change the rules so that all candidates who have more than 20 MPS nominating them will be put to the members in a ballot conducted on the Preferential Vote system of election”.

Separately, Dominic Raab risked a Cabinet row with Philip Hammond after questioning the worth of economic forecasts about Brexit, days after the Chancellor warned that no deal could cause major damage. The Brexit Secretary said in an interview with The Sunday Times that some projections needed to be treated with “a measure of caution”, adding that GDP estimates for 2019 “have been revised up”.