SOUTH West Surrey Conservatives were tight-lipped this week after The Herald learned the shock news that they had made their agent redundant.
Senior Tories including local MP Virginia Bottomley and chairman of the South West Surrey Conservative Association (SWSCA), Warren Lister, refused to be drawn on the redundancy.
But the former agent, Frensham woman Christine Merry Price, revealed that her job loss was "common knowledge" among party members.
An anonymous letter from a fully paid-up member of the Conservative Party alerted The Herald to the job cut.
In the letter, the party member claimed to be horrified at the decision, which is alleged to have been made without "consultation of the membership at large".
The important news comes as the Tories in Waverley face a strong threat from the borough's Liberal Democrat group. After losing control of the borough council to the Lib Dems in the May local elections, the Tories are also faced with preparing for the departure of Mrs Bottomley from the political scene.
The party's new prospective parliamentary candidate, Jeremy Hunt, will now be preparing for the general elections without the support of an agent.
Mr Hunt is expected to be fighting the Tory corner against local Lib Dem candidate Simon Cordon, who came a nail-bitingly close second place to Mrs Bottomley in the 2001 general election. Mrs Bottomley clinched her seat with a majority of just 861.
Although the date of the next general election has not been set, Mr Hunt is already getting ready for his campaign to mop up voters from Mrs Bottomley.
Both Mr Hunt and Mrs Bottomley refused to comment on the redundancy to The Herald.
And a guarded Mr Lister said that he too was unable to talk about the matter, although he added that the party had no plans to appoint a new agent in the "foreseeable future".
The Tory camp also remained silent on the issue of insufficient funds, but a spokesman for the party said that she was positive about the situation.
She said: "We are working harder than ever before in this constituency. All of the political parties are going through financial changes and we have had to restructure our finances after the last local election."
A public statement of SWCA's accounts for the year ending December 31, 2001, showed that the organisation's annual expenditure was almost £1,000 higher than its annual income of £72,549.
The account statement showed that there were 1,670 local paid-up members of the party who raised a total of £37,542 in subscriptions.