This Saturday, grassroot conservatives across the nation nestled in the city of Bournemouth to enlighten themselves with the refreshing back to basic Tory rhetoric. While enemies of Traditional Conservatives tried to thwart this event as 4D Chess moves from Johnsonites (although repeatedly stated not a Pro-Johnson movement from the CDO), what seemed to be the aurora of the conference was just the basic memo, bringing the Conservative Party back to you, the members, representing what not only The Burges Group stands but what any conservative should.
While highlighting speeches such as from Priti Patel MP on the effects of abandoning of grass root voters causing the local election defeat or former Prime Ministers Boris Johnson's online appearance firing up the crowd arguing keeping up the fight for Low taxation, what caught my eye was our friend Jacob Rees-Mogg.
Jacob Rees Moggs speech was a riveting and straightforward speech, a bastion of tradition yet upholding the pragmatic truth to issues when needed.
In relation to Jacob Rees-Mogg speech, It was right to point out from the start when David Campbell Bannerman, CDO's chair, stated that the party was "dying as an institution".
While the CDO intentions remain true to inject the Party with some life by representing the members voice as not being in touch with your grassroot supporters is a disaster for any partisan party, the issue is rather a trickle down issue, a problem that can be solved up, it being harder from bottom to top. The leadership from within ought to change easier with a middle man that can give us a platform.
There was only one man who has all those powers necessary and that is Jacob Rees-Mogg
We can clearly see his influence with the recent CDO event, where members went to not only support the democratisation of the internal Conservative party leadership but to listen to such a man as Jacob Rees-Mogg.
In a ConservativeHome article it stated for one MP that
"One of my members has mentioned that he's going to their conference in Bournemouth to hear Jacob Rees-Mogg speak. That's it really. He just likes Jacob Rees-Mogg. So what? I don't see anything very sinister in that."
While only being one example, what people don't realise is that while the impetus of actual authority (Ministers and CCHQ Workers) maybe able to make change within the party, what many conservatives forget is that political soft power influences party politics and the agenda more often than not. (That's how after all the progressives have managed to gain influence in our intuitions)
Jacob does not only have a spine for true traditionalism but he has prudence as a leader. His prudence was seen when Rees-Mogg with confidence stated "We must not change leaders again," he says. "We must support Rishi Sunak to the general election or we will be toast.", after all we aren't Lonnies.
While causing a state of disagreement, in true Mogg fashion he underlines the balance of true conservative values and not being carried away by the emotional drawbacks of the internal issues. It is not to say Jacob is always toeing the party line, aforementioned he knows the frustrations we hold , especially with the way Brexit is being carried out, but knows not to play into the Liberal Agenda that we as disgruntled traditional conservatives are the ones causing chaos for the Government.
He further highlights his disagreements with the Government:
"In the interest of conservative democracy we really do have to support our current leader" and "politics grows from the bottom up," and warned the party against any attempt to cut the membership out of the leadership process.
"The people who have messed it up have been the MPs not the members of our party," he told the conference.
Mr Sunak had "run away from repealing EU law" by watering down the Retained EU Law Bill, which he said was "not a sign of strength".
The Conservative Party is rapidly going through highs and lows and it seems to be as Burke states of the little platooners vs the world. As the Neo-Liberals have gained a grip over the Party with the progressive Civil servants willing to be subservient ruining the Government's plans, strong conviction filled traditionalist need to rally over a figure who has a solid platform and can maintain a sense of cultural authority over the Party. Jacob Rees-Mogg coming out of the CDO conference today has set his realistic boundaries and objections to the half written Brexit policies of this Government.
Mogg attracts not only "True Conservatives" but he gains the attraction of the youth and non traditional Conservatives voters by his mannerism and intelligence which we have so longed in our British political system
We saw this early on with the 2016 influence of JRM, the Liberal establishment was frightened of what he could mean for a leadership contest—where the activists enjoy the final say on rules never previously used to pick a prime minister—that some cabinet ministers want to avoid such a ballot. Tory MPs—who get to whittle down the final shortlist of two that goes to the members—are planning to exclude Rees-Mogg.
Overall, the CDO event aligns with The Bruges Groups values of authentic Conservativism giving back to the people who make up the Conservative Party, by giving a platform to grassroot conservativism, however it seems to myself that there was a clear man who we need currently to guide not only the party but steer the government to the right agenda that is Jacob Rees-Mogg.