Top-secret document tears into association

Headed up by Tory Party grandee Matthew Carrington and senior backbencher Sir Richard Ottaway, the board reported back in mid-July following a two-month inquiry. Its findings were damning for the local party leaders trying to force Miss McIntosh out.

Their shake-up of the executive board which would decide her fate was “wrong”, and against party rules designed to “prevent an unrepresentative takeover of an executive council”. The new appointments were “clearly co-options by any other name”.

Local leaders had “failed to follow established norms” and left membership of the committee “confused and muddled”.

This, it said, was “crucial”, given that “the very first task of the meeting of the new executive council was to consider a very serious matter – a motion on the readoption of the Conservative MP”.

The executive’s decision to de-select Miss McIntosh was therefore “fundamentally flawed”, and should be set aside.

The report was dismissive too of the “wholly unsubstantiated” complaints against the MP by her opponents, and particularly critical of suggestions Miss McIntosh is too concerned with her Parliamentary affairs.

“Some of the issues of ‘concern’ expressed were totally misconceived, and appeared to indicate a lack of proper understanding of the role of a Member of Parliament,” the report found.

On the wider state of the association, the report highlighted a “lack of trust and level of suspicion” among local members, and called on them to “unite” in the wider interests of the party.

All the reports findings are disputed by local Tory party executives, who insist they acted entirely within the rules.

• Today the Yorkshire Post publishes in full for the first time the internal Conservative Party report into Thirsk & Malton Conservative Association, and its attempts to oust sitting MP Anne McIntosh. Read the full report here