MUSIC. JONATHAN BEALE: In 1997 the country turned its back on a party that was out of touch. These images of defeat will be hard to erase. But the Conservatives are looking hopefully into the future. The party is now in the process of choosing its prospective parliamentary candidates, it's a chance to widen its appeal. The future though looks mostly white, Euro-sceptic and male. ANGELA GUILLAME: I'm afraid that in many cases there is a view that that women perhaps should not be doing this job, that Conservative women are not suitable for politics. I regret to say that enormously because it's an absurd thing even to think. LORD TEBBIT: If I were to be advising a cynical young man - a chap like say Tony Blair - on how to get on in politics and he had decided to join the Conservative Party rather than the Labour Party, I would say to him you must be a Euro-sceptic . It's as simple as that. BEALE: Peter Bone believes he's the future of Toryism. He also happens to be male, white and Euro-sceptic. He's been selected to fight Wellingborough by local party activists - and they're already out campaigning for him. Labour has a slender majority here. But Peter Bone believes Europe will be the deciding factor to win the seat back for the Conservatives. PETER BONE: You can argue that we lost the seat because of the UK Independence Party's intervention. Now, I want to reach out and bring those people into our fold because I believe that ninety per cent of those people are natural Conservative voters, but on the national stage there cannot be a more important issue than whether we are part of a European state or whether we retain our sovereignty BEALE: In Kensington and Chelsea another Euro-sceptic has just been chosen to fight a by-election. But out campaigning for Michael Portillo is a pro European. Damian Garrido is also looking for selection. He knows his views may not go down well with some Tory associations. So far they certainly haven't opened many doors. DAMIAN GARRIDO: The danger for the Conservative Party in only having parliamentary candidates who are hostile to the European Union is that the party will only appeal to a small number of the British electorate for who being hostile to Europe is an important issue and it will turn off the vast majority of people BEALE: Under William Hague's leadership the Conservative Party has taken a tough stance on Europe, ruling out membership of a single currency for this parliament and the next. But On The Record can reveal that the party's new Parliamentary candidates take an even harder line. A glance into the future shows a party that may rule out the single currency for ever: In a survey for On The Record we asked new Tory prospective Parliamentary candidates to respond to the statement: 'Joining the Single Currency will end the UK as a sovereign nation?' Fifty-five of sixty-five candidates took part. Forty-three of them agreed membership would take away sovereignty. That's seventy-eight per cent, only two disagreed, just four per cent, ten said neither. When that same statement was put to seventy Tory backbench MPs in a separate academic survey, forty-six agreed that joining the single currency would end sovereignty. That's sixty-six per cent. Twenty disagreed, just twenty-eight per cent, four said neither. BONE: I would say eighty per cent of the British people support our view that we want to be in the European Union, but we don't want to become part of a European Socialist super state and that we want nothing to do with the single European Currency. GARRIDO: There are a number of pointers that we may be selecting too narrower a bunch of candidates for the next election. There's your own survey for example, which tests people's views about the Euro, about the sovereignty of the United Kingdom and its role within the European Union. And those results give a worrying indication that too narrow a band of people are being selected. BEALE: But what will the Tory Party of tomorrow feel about membership of the European Union itself. The leadership has made clear that withdrawal is not being considered. But when weighing up Britain's membership, many new candidates are not convinced of the advantages. It raises the question as to whether the Tory party of the future will one day press for Britain to leave the EU. The academic survey of current Tory MPs shows there's already strong doubts about the benefits of EU membership. When the seventy MPs were asked to consider the statement: 'The disadvantages of EU membership have been outweighed by the benefits' twenty-nine disagreed, that's forty-two per cent. Twenty-six agreed the benefits were greater, thirty-seven per cent, fifteen said neither was true. The view among the prospective parliamentary candidates is just as strong. When asked to consider the same statement, twenty-four disagreed, believing the disadvantages were greater. That's forty-four per cent. Eighteen or thirty-three per cent thought the benefits outweighed the disadvantages, thirteen thought neither was true. But candidates who expressed the more Euro-sceptical view are getting selected may only be a mirror image of the party's grassroots. They after all have the final say in selection meetings. And their views on the single currency are clear: ACTUALITY: Because if you get rid of the pound we're going to lose out again. We lost out when we were decimalised.' BEALE: But Tory Central Office says the party is still a broad church: DAMIAN GREEN MP: I'm a member of the positive European group and I don't hide that fact and don't feel the need to, I've never trimmed my views and I've been appointed to the Front Bench by William Hague. Or you can hold the views that are much more Euro-sceptic than mine and still be loyal to party policy. It seems to me overwhelmingly sensible that precisely because the issue of Europe is so complex and people across parties hold a range of views on it that the Conservative Party will continue to have in its ranks people who do hold a wide range of views on it. TEBBIT: I think the block on Europhile Conservatives getting into Parliament is not in Central Office it's in the constituencies. Where the constituency parties are simply not adopting Europhile candidates and that's as it should be. BEALE: The real test will be whether these candidates reflect the views of the electorate they want to represent. Opinion polls show that the majority of the public oppose membership of the single currency. But pollsters also point out that most people put other issues higher up the political agenda. As Peter Bone is finding out in a local pub: ACTUALITY IAN TAYLOR MP: Europe is not the key issue on which people vote. So if we allow ourselves to be dragged off the centre ground by appearing to be extremist on this big issue, the public will think that we're probably extreme in other issues too and it will leave us in opposition. BEALE: The Conservatives are not just in danger of being perceived as a party dominated by one issue, but also a party that's dominated by men. The leadership says it wants more women MPs, but so far the list of new candidates suggest that the Tory Party of the future will fail to increase their number significantly. Only one sixth of the candidates who've been selected are women. Those who've tried and failed say prejudice in Tory associations is preventing more women from becoming MPs. GUILLAME: The problem I think is that at selection committees questions are asked which wouldn't be asked of men. I mean I was once asked on seeing that we sail quite a lot whether I obeyed my husband on board our boat. GREEN: We ought to have more women MPs. And what the problem being that we don't want to go down the route of quotas that the Labour Party went down and not least because many colleagues who are women MPs don't want to go down that route and so I hope that Selection Committees will find that the many good women candidates out there do get selected for winnable seats. But you know, who are I to talk. BEALE: The Tory Party is predominantly a man's world. But this week a group of Tory women will publish a paper in conjunction with the Centre for Policy Studies calling on the party to take urgent action. They want thirty per cent of candidates to be women at the next election. What is the danger for the party in electoral terms if you do not have more women candidates? GUILLAME: Oh we'll become unelectable. I mean it's the women of this country that have kept the Conservatives in power. If women during this century had voted in the same way as men the Conservatives would not have been in power as often as they have. BEALE: Certain groups and individuals may feel left on the fringes, but they haven't given up the fight. This meeting with MPs from the centre ground is attracting a new generation of student activists. The party leadership too realises it must l fight the next election on a broad range of issues that will unite the party; and it must hope the activists remember to do the same. GARRIDO: It's now up to the constituency parties to make sure they provide William Hague and the Conservative Party with a broad balanced parliamentary party after the next general election and they must rise to that challenge. BEALE: There is still time to broaden the party's appeal before the General Election. But so far the Conservatives have yet to offer a vision of the future that will reflect the views of the whole party yet alone the electorate they want to represent.