Conservative MP Brian Binley today accused the Tory leadership of having a “disdainful view” of the party’s volunteers.
Mr Binley, said he had urged a probe at a top level party meeting this afternoon but admitted it was “pretty overwhelmingly rejected”.
The Conservative leadership has rallied around Lord Feldman in the row over Telegraph and Times reports that an ally of the Prime Minister described local party associations as “mad, swivel-eyed loons” who forced MPs to adopt hardline stances.
The peer, who was not named in the newspaper reports, was forced to deny making the comments after intense internet speculation.
Members of the party’s board gathered at the Double Tree Hilton this afternoon, but amid a heavy media presence they later relocated to Conservative HQ for their monthly meeting. Tory aides insisted the meeting had always been due to take place at CCHQ.
Leaving the gathering, Tory vice-chairman Mr Binley said: “I did propose, as I said I would, a form of investigation into this matter which was pretty overwhelmingly rejected.”
He said the board had been “unanimous in its support for Andrew Feldman”.
A senior Tory source said the board discussed the issue for 30 to 40 minutes before voting on whether to hold an investigation. Mr Binley was said to be the only one in favour.
Lord Feldman, a close friend of the Prime Minister, reiterated that he had denied using the words in an informal after-dinner chat with journalists.
Mr Binley told reporters that people “accepted” Lord Feldman’s word. “I have never said that he did say it,” he insisted.
Although his call for an investigation was rejected, “it was felt that there was a need to look at the narrowing of the gap between the party in the country and the leadership”, the Northampton South MP said.
“I understand what David Cameron is saying about trying to reach out to more people than the Conservative Party, but he has to realise that he is the caretaker of the Conservative Party and not the proprietor of the Conservative Party.”
The Conservative Party board, chaired by Lord Feldman, has 22 members of which five are backbenchers, including Mr Binley.
Earlier, Tory vice-chairman Bob Neill had stepped up the war of words between Conservative central office and the press, telling Sky News: “I think we have to be very, very wary of this, I think, rather slipshod bit of journalism.”
But board member Mr Binley said that if the remarks were made by someone in Mr Cameron’s inner circle it would not be a surprise, because the leadership had a “disdainful” view of the party’s volunteers.
Mr Binley said he was “perfectly happy to believe” what Lord Feldman had told him, but he said he would urge the board to hold a full investigation into the alleged remarks.
“I want an investigation by the party,” he told reporters as he entered the meeting at CCHQ.
Asked if the results should be published, the 71-year-old MP replied: “I think they need to be. I think it needs to be undertaken very quickly.”