William Hague has had a tough time since becoming leader of the Conservative Party but occasionally he receives a glimmer of good news.

His heart must have been gladdened this week by the decision of Bexhill and Battle MP Charles Wardle not to contest the next general election.

But he did have to endure an extraordinary article last week in a national newspaper in which Mr Wardle had the temerity to write a paean of praise for Mohammed Al Fayed after announcing that he had accepted a £120,000 directorship from the Harrod's owner. The displeasure of local Tory activists meant it might have been hard for him to survive much longer in any case.

Mr Hague has good political nous, which is more than can be said for the hapless MP for Bexhill. How could he possibly have imagined that his association with Mr Al Fayed could have been regarded with any approbation by fellow Conservatives who are convinced the cash for questions scandal did more than anything else to bring down the last Government?

Even though he registered his contract openly and promptly, Mr Wardle should have realised that accepting this huge sum of cash from a questionable source on top of his own substantial salary would not go down well with the good burghers of Bexhill, many of whom are old age pensioners on low incomes.

Mr Wardle is 60 and will soon disappear into comfortable obscurity. If anyone remembers him at all in the future, it is likely to be for his cash from Al Fayed rather than any mark he made in Parliament and even old-style Tory MPs, with comfortable majorities, ought to be able to do better than this.

William Hague has to rebuild his party and is managing to do so now that a host of names much bigger than that of Charles Wardle, such as Messrs Major and Heseltine, have announced they will also be going at the next election. What Tories put in their place will help to determine how well they do at the polls.

It's highly significant that in Hove and Brighton Kemp Town, Conservatives have chosen active councillors as their prospective candidate such as Mayor Jenny Langston and opposition leader Geofrey Theobald. But even more intriguing is the selection for Brighton Pavilion.

David Gold is only 27 and beat dozens of older men and women to secure his place in the Brighton sun. He is energetic, astute and prepared to be controversial. He is also openly gay and it's a sign of the times that this has been accepted and even welcomed by his local party.

Mr Gold has a mountain to climb if he is to unseat the sitting Labour MP David Lepper, who has a five-figure majority and is regarded by most people as an excellent constituency member. But it will be the first time the Tories have had an energetic, committed local campaigner not from the right of the party.

Mr Hague is said to have Florida woman, a modern female who holidays in that part of the USA, as a typical Tory voter at the next election. He should be reassured to have candidates such as the Brighton man who could attract her vote. At any rate he would far rather have him than the Bexhill dinosaur.

A Worthing reader has been kind enough to point out to DAN, the Department of Appropriate Names, a stalwart in the British Institute of Innkeeping. He is called Keith de Bruin.

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