CCHQ in the raw. A moment of political history

Anyone who has ever read a political [auto]biography or the like will know about the glossy pages in the middle that have relevant pictures in them. Sometimes there are two sections if the biography spans many years, or events of serious and significant importance.

In years to come I have this strange feeling that May Day 2008 will be such a day. It will mark a point in the history of the Tory Party where it finally recovered from the reality of losing in catastrophic style in 1997.

Tim Montgomerie, the editor of Conservative Home happened to be in CCHQ last night for that moment and he got some brilliant photos of that, in my personal opinion, capture brilliantly the tension, the atmosphere and the reality of that was being echoed across the country down to grassroots level of a night where it suddenly felt really good to be a Tory again.

There is not a shadow of doubt in my mind that whatever happens at the next General Election, these pictures will be used in a book that chronicles the rise of David Cameron and the rebirth of the Tory Party in the post-Thatcherite and post-Blairite era.

Be under no illusions, there will only ever be the "Brown Years". Brown, like Major before him (who was immensely under-rated due to events), will not be a man that ever has the word "era" after his name.

Whether Cameron will achieve such things remains unknown, but the pictures portray not just an emotional reality, but an historical one too. I believe the popular phrase is "tipping point".

Andy Coulson listen to Eric Pickles
Francis Maude smiles. A rare moment I believe, but the picture captures the atmosphere in the so-called "pod"
The key here I think is to remember that whilst the Labour line has been to do their best to say this will put Cameron's policies under the spotlight, what they've failed to "get", and this si something Blair would have, is the old fashioned "wind of change".

Mind you, one Labour Cabinet member did get it when he said that people see their "tax bills are going up, that their fuel prices are going up, that their utility bills are going up and they want to know that we're doing more to help them through difficult times and that we are on their side." It's the little things we react to Mr Balls, did you not realise that whilst you were in working out your neoclassical endogenous growth theory?
Pictures from Conservative Home