The following letter was published in The Times on October 26, two days after Rishi Sunak became the third Conservative leader this year.
Sir, As your editorial (Oct. 25) correctly says: “Both main parties have baroque arrangements for electing their leaders that empower unrepresentative activists.” The Conservative Party claims to have 160,000 members. Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak polled nearly 142,000 members between them in this summer’s leadership poll. Did 18,000 abstain? No one knows because the party does not publish a membership list. Such secrecy is absurd in an age which places such store by openness and transparency. This is just one feature of an election system which ought to have been reformed long ago by the 1922 Committee. When he was Conservative Party leader in 2005, Michael Howard courageously showed the way with proposals that provided for intense consultation with party members but placed the decision in the hands of MPs. That plan narrowly failed to get the necessary two-thirds support when put to a vote in the party. The 1922 Committee must work out a system that prevents a recurrence of this year’s turmoil.
Lord Lexden
Conservative Party historian
