CCHQ are having their Christmas party tonight. Somebody is worried that the boys and girls will get out of hand. Surely not, this isn’t the Bullingdon Club after all…

The Human Resources party-pooper is Giles Inglis-Jones, who once tried to impose a gagging contract on all CCHQ staff. He is not popular at CCHQ nor, as you can see above, was the gagging contract successful.

UPDATE : The Tory Christmas card is here. The more ideological one from those Eurosceptic jokers is here.

CCHQ have just sent out a “Why, oh why” press release about the OFT ruling from the shadow Farms Minister, James Paice, headlined “The price of milk should not be fixed”.

There really is no point crying over this…

Gove does the intellectual attack muttering about a sad loss of idealism one minute, next minute CCHQ rolls out this poster to commemorate non-election day. Coulson wouldn’t have had a hand in this would he?

The Tories got all Eeeed-up with this video to the conference hall. What with Thatcher becoming (as exclusively predicted here) cool again and now the Tories leading a rave revival it is all giving Guido a warm nostalgic feeling. Acieeed!

Nadine Dorries MP is having problems getting a pass for the Tory conference, her researcher has already been refused a pass on the grounds that his pass was taken in front of a tree.

Something tells Guido that the news that education policy dissident Graham Brady will be speaking at a Tory fringe event organised by the National Grammar Schools Association will not fill CCHQ’s Cameroons with joy. The media will be looking for “Tory division” stories in what will be a packed room. Shouldn’t be too hard to find plenty of old school Tories there…

Hat-tip : Ben Brogan

Iain has a story about the Daily Mirror Caught Trying to Infiltrate Conservative HQ with a posh girl. She came unstuck after they Googled her name and came up with her Mirror byline, then they checked the source of her email back to the Mirror’s offices. Doh!

Iain mutters darkly about legal action – presumably lying on her CV and at the interview – which is a form of attempted fraud. Don’t hold your breath on that going anywhere. Who hasn’t?

Anyway isn’t this what investigative journalists are supposed to do?

Iain is having a go at Peter Ainsworth for going M.I.A. (Missing In Airtime) during the floods, Benedict Brogan said something similar about part-time shadow cabinet members recently, a bemused journo told Guido he couldn’t believe Hague was missing from the last Zimbabwe debate, the M.I.A. list is endless.

CCHQ is nowadays staffed by people who have never won an election and don’t even seem to fight to win the way the usually third placed Cowley Street operators do. CCHQ needs to move to battle-stations rather than the lacking any sense of urgency, business-as-usual default mode.

For every Alan Duncan, Chris Grayling and David Davis there are two Shadow Cabinet slackers. When you remember the mid-90s and compare how New Labour’s leading lights grabbed broadcast airtime like it was oxygen, you have to wonder. Do these people really have the drive to win?