Attracting new talent to our Party (as candidates, office bearers and activists)

Having grown up in the Scottish Conservative & Unionist Party I know just how good our members are, but I also know just how badly we need an injection of new blood to make us even better.

Organisationally we urgently need new members to help our Associations with every aspect of their activities.

Fundamentally this means we need to undertake a massive recruitment drive and what better time than now with our pledge base renewed and updated by canvassing for a General Election and a new Conservative led government in place. The majority of people I meet are very enthusiastic that coalition government will deliver something new and exciting and we need to use this to our advantage.

At Association level, we need new people to help run our constituency organisations as Chairmen, Treasurers and Office Bearers. When this is suggested to even the more established of our members a perception that it is time consuming and complex proves to be a barrier to their service.

To make serving local Association's less daunting we must ensure there is an active and comprehensive programme of training available to members who want to find out what specific roles entail. For me this means utilising the resource of some of our longer serving members who are only too happy to lend a hand in training new people from the benefit of their own experience.

So, I believe we need a formal programme to be in place so that every Association knows where and when they can access training as the need arises.

Where we are able to identify support who do not want to join we should be glad of their participation as "activists" - whether that be delivering a street or two with In Touch leaflets or supporting door-to-door canvass sessions. I believe it is time for us to evolve an "activists" programme across the country so that we involve more people in regular activity on behalf of our Party.

In summary we must be an open door to people who share our principles and who want to help.

In terms of attracting new candidates to strengthen our team of talent, I find it dispiriting when I meet people across the country who have all the attributes required to be exceptional candidates but who simply have never thought about it and have never been asked.

We need to recognise that the day is coming, (probably 2015), when we may very well need to field 59 Westminster candidates on the same day as we field 73 Scottish Parliament candidates for elections on the same day and that being able to select from a large pool of quality individuals would serve our Associations well.

How do we attract new talent? I wrote a paper for the Executive Committee on this two years ago putting forward a range of initiatives. The following is indicative and not prescriptive and I am sure members will come up with a hundred new and better suggestions, but should we not be involved in recruitment of candidates through:

i) Advertising in trade journals (targeting people like: lawyers, accountants, doctors, nurses etc.) and in society publications (Countryside Alliance, No.1 Magazine etc.)

ii) Proactive Recruitment by taking stands at Trade Fairs (like: the CBI Scotland Conference, Scottish Chambers Conference, STUC Conference etc.); by taking stalls at Events (like: Scottish Game Fair, Scottish Community Council Association Annual Meeting, Graduates Fairs etc.); and by engaging in direct mail targeted at individuals who are active in their local communities and who have shown they have something to offer their Country.

We also need to have structures capable of reaching out to people in local communities so that the public spirited in each area are at least asked to consider extending their public service by standing for election as a Conservative candidate.

This is an issue I feel strongly about and I believe we need a formal committee within the Party to take recruitment, at every level, forward. If we do establish this committee it needs to have a range of expertise round the table from former SCUA and SCUP officers to members of our professional staff and experts in recruitment.