Archie Hamilton, architect of the scheme

"Adoption" Scheme for Former Tory Seats

The idea is for each sitting MP to "nurture" constituencies where the Conservatives lost in order to support the local parties there.

Sir Archibald Hamilton, chairman of the backbench 1922 Committee which agreed the scheme at a meeting at the Commons, said, "The idea will be to keep those constituencies going and encouraged, to offer them a lifeline to Westminster. We don't want to see them disintegrate."

He envisaged the scheme being required for only one or two years. "There will come a moment in the cycle when this Government will be unbelievably unpopular and the whole task of rebuilding will become easier."

Each sitting MP would probably need to look after two constituencies - perhaps adjacent to their own, or seats they had previously fought or where they had family links, he said. "It's got to be done with great care and delicacy so we make links that are most agreeable to all concerned."

The way to handle Scotland, Wales and big cities like Liverpool and Birmingham, which are now totally devoid of Tory MPs, has yet to be decided.

Michael Mates, the secretary of the 1922 Committee, has been put in charge of coordinating the scheme. It has yet to be seen how members of the 164-strong parliamentary party will take to the idea of nursing constituencies other than their own.