Portillo calls for a more relevant Royal Family

The former Tory cabinet minister Michael Portillo has called for reform of the monarchy to "ensure its relevance and place in the modern world".

Mr Portillo said the Conservative leadership should call for an overhaul of the Royal Family's workings as part of a symbolic break with the party's past similar to Labour's abolition of Clause Four.

Other "Clause Four-style" issues the Tories should address included the adoption of all-women shortlists for parliamentary seats, an attack on Enron-style corruption in business and support for devolution, he said.

In a speech in Oxford, Mr Portillo also renewed his criticism of Iain Duncan Smith, declaring that the Tories had no "consistent message" on their commitment to modernisation. He refused to say if the Tory leader was the right man to be in charge of the party.

Although Labour MPs have repeatedly gone on record to attack the monarchy after the collapsed trial of the former royal butler Paul Burrell, no Tory MPs have ventured even a hint of criticism.

But when he delivered the fifth Chatham Lecture at Trinity College, Mr Portillo said it was time to enter the debate about how to achieve a more modern Royal Family. "The Conservative Party, which is inextricably committed to the monarchy, should be the party that is willing to discuss reforming the monarchy, and to making sure the British people are able to respect the institution," he said. "We should be the party that ensures its place in the modern world."

Some Tory modernisers are understood to be keen on the idea of a Japanese-style "Office of the Monarchy", staffed by civil servants instead of palace courtiers, to run the Royal Family's affairs.

In his lecture, "How Might the Right Right Itself?", Mr Portillo said the public still sees the Tories as "a party that is divided". He said: "The public is very unclear about what the party stands for."When Mr Portillo was asked if Mr Duncan Smith was "the right man" to lead the party, he said: "I'm not going to answer any questions about personalities."

Mr Portillo said the Tories were changing, if only slowly. "The Labour Party had to display a neon sign to indicate that it had changed. One of the ways it did that was the debate on Clause Four. They also did a lot of other things that were counter-intuitive. This is something we should emulate."

He said that more female and ethnic-minority Tory candidates were essential but admitted all-women shortlists had damaged his own leadership chances. "During the election one MP said he would give me his vote if I promised to rule out women-only shortlists, and I had to disappoint him. I do believe you have to take strong action to convince women that the party has changed."

His remarks will shatter the uneasy truce declared over the past week between Mr Portillo, Kenneth Clarke and the party leadership after the "gay adoption" rebellion in the Commons.

"In the United States, when the Republicans were out of power for a long time, they developed a form of compassionate conservatism and that meant listening to groups they hadn't listened to before, listening to the interests of black and Hispanic voters," Mr Portillo said. "The question is 'Should we Conservatives learn something from that?' And my answer is, 'Durr, yeah, I think we really ought to learn something from that'."