Tory donors join select club to dine with Hague

The Conservative Party was revealed last night as having raised more than £1m through an exclusive club for donors.

The Conservative Party was revealed last night as having raised more than £1m through an exclusive club for donors.

The Front Bench Club gives its wealthy members direct access to the party leader, William Hague, and the Shadow Cabinet at dinners and lunches in return for a fee of £5,000 a year.

The club is believed to have more than 200 members and party fund-raisers hope that a target of 300 can be reached before the end of the year. However, Labour challenged the Tories to make it clear that they had not breached parliamentary rules and that no rooms or restaurants in the House of Commons had been used for the fund-raising activities.

The Conservative Party declined to say yesterday where the dinners were held.