Question: One theme that's come out of the three party conferences is tolerance - how important is this issue going to be at the forthcoming election?

Steve Norris: "As an issue it may very well not be important, in inverted commas, at election time; if only because I want to ensure that no party, certainly not the Conservative Party, goes into the election other than as tolerant and inclusive and the whole essence of a belief in tolerance and inclusivity is that it is a given in sane, mature, democratic societies. And so ironically, I think the big issues are going to be Europe, big government versus less government, tax versus less tax, public spending versus less public spending. I don't want this crucially important issue to be an issue at all come election time. I hope this paradox is clear to people."

Question: Would you agree that in the past the Conservative Party has appeared to be intolerant?

Steve Norris: "I don't believe that if you searched all of the statements that the Tories have made over the years that you could accuse them of intolerance but what I think that other people, like John Bercow - a noted right-winger in the party - have confessed that as a party the Tories were remarkably unsuccessful in, for example, recognising the value of ethnic minorities, both as supporters of the party and as British citizens, with all the entitlements in the democracy that we ought to be extending to them. So one of the things I always say and I'm accused of just saying this for the sake of good order and avoiding conflict is that I've never met racism in the Tory Party and I've never met intolerance, but that's actually true, I'm not talking about the occasional ranting from Norman Tebbit, I'm talking about serious Conservatives. I think that as John Bercow said in a very important speech he made at our party conference, it's clear that in the past, whether we understood it or not, we were sending out signals that said that we were not desperately interested in ethnic minority issues or ethnic minority votes."

Question: Would it be fair to say some quarters of the Conservative party may have been institutionally racist?

Steve Norris: "I'm not going to respond to the invitation to describe the Party in those terms because I think it's potentially pejorative to do so and also because I happen to be one of the few people to have read the MacPherson report and I know what MacPherson was trying to drive at. If you look at the Party, which had a woman as Prime Minister for over a decade, that had the first Jewish Prime Minister from its ranks, that had the first Asian MP within its ranks and that has currently got at least one Asian likely to be an MP and about a dozen others in seats already, no I don't think you could accuse us of that, but I think the real issue is genuinely more subtle. The Tories abhor the idea generally of positive discrimination because they regard it as nonetheless discrimination, now I absolutely understand that and I might say it's even true in terms of whether or not we improve the number of women who are standing as candidates in the winnable seats. There again I get from women Conservatives often a real concern about positive discrimination in any form and so that's slowed down our progress in changing the way the party looks because it is much more difficult to make progress on that sort of basis. Labour took the issue of positive discrimination head on - black sections, women only shortlists and it swallowed the concerns many of its members had and produced a party which looks much more like Britain."

Question: So would you suggest the Conservatives follow Labour's example?

Steve Norris: "No, what I've said to the Conservatives is this. If we are, for perfectly understandable reasons, not willing to go down the road of positive discrimination then what structured actions are we going to take to make sure that our party, particularly at a senior public level and that of course includes parliamentary representation, looks more like Britain ? That's my challenge."

Question: How would you suggest you do that?

Steve Norris: "I think one of the things the party needs to do is to follow through William Hague's signature to the CRE leadership challenge, which he signed up to at the Bournemouth Conference and which commits the party to a programme of ensuring that people from ethnic minorities for example, are actually considered for and positioned in senior positions within the party. The party at a senior level, even internally where appointments can be made looks too monochrome. That's something we can do because we can do it internally, something I know William and Michael Ancram are thoroughly signed up to. What I'm really reassured by is that I'm not the only person who believes this is an important issue. William made it clear when he appointed me that he had watched what we had done in London, he liked what we had done and effectively what he was saying was 'can we have some more of that please'. This is a man who's made the speeches this week which has made it clear that he believes that an inclusive party is precisely that it will have people who take Ann Widdecombe's view on drugs and it will have people who take perhaps an alternative view but they're all welcome in the party which is hinged around many more broad principles, so I think, to go back to your question, you can do something through appointments, through the structure of the party, through the way in which we select candidates, through the way in which we offer training and support to candidates at various points along the road, all of which can produce, by organisational means if you like, what the party seems unwilling to do through more overt positive discrimination."

Question: When are you hoping to see results?

Steve Norris: "Realistically, it's too late in this electoral cycle for us to see very visible results before the General Election, although I know the party will be making some announcement shortly that will be vindication of the success we're having in promoting people from ethnic minorities particularly, within the party - but Michael Ancram will talk more about that in due course. During the lifetime of the next Parliament I think we've got an urgent challenge because by the timing of the next General Election after the one we're about to have and that could be as late as 2007, so we've got a big timescale here, by that time I don't believe we will be able to plead shortage of time or interest, by then we will have to have accomplished a party that looks broadly like Britain. If we can do that by internal means then actually that will have been a better path to go down than the path of positive discrimination, because there's no doubt when you do have women only shortlists, black sections where you couldn't have men only shortlists or white sections, there are genuine concerns among true democrats who say 'Hang on, that can't be the way to do things' - so in my party which does have this very strong democratic streak, which means that it's the absolute 'kiss of death' to any candidate to be known as the Central Office choice when he or she is going for a seat somewhere, that's very healthy incidentally. My party, if its not going to go down that road [of positive discrimination] has got to make these organisational changes that actually make it work."

Question: Let's say someone comes up to you and says 'I'm racist, I'm homophobic - I'm voting Conservative because your party best represents my interests - what would you say to them?

Steve Norris: "I would say to them there is much joy in Heaven for every sinner that repenteth. I think the serious answer to your question is that some of the people who will support you at election time, even support you personally, Ken and I between us - he got three quarters of a million and I got two thirds of a million - these are the people who put their crosses by his name and my name - I know there will be some people who did that who I privately would have preferred not to have but the nature of a democracy is that you don't dictate to people what final decisions they make. If there are people who vote Conservative for reasons which I personally don't find attractive, first of all I'm not about to dictate my preferences to them, secondly if they are in the party then I have an opportunity to persuade them that there are other ways to look at issues, but thirdly, we as a party have got to make it clear that the leadership of this party is not xenophobic, is not racist, is not homophobic and does believe in tolerance and equality. Now if you understand that and you want to vote for us then that's good enough for me. If your private predilections are otherwise, well that's your own conscious you have to live with."

Question: So you wouldn't stand on principle and say - 'If you're a racist, you're a homophobe don't vote for us'?

Steve Norris: "I would want to say if you're a racist or a homophobe - homophobia is a dislike of the concept of homosexuality, an aversion to it - if you're a racist, certainly I don't want to be associated with you, I can't stop you supporting the party but I don't want ever the Conservative Party and no more does William to find its favour with racists or xenophobes, or for that matter people who are homophobic and are prepared to discriminate against people who are gay on that basis, because William's talked about living with lifestyles you don't necessarily happen to share - that's what tolerance, distinct from inclusivity or equality, is all about and I think he's dead right. I would want to say to people who are ostensibly homophobic - do you really understand what this issue is all about ? Do you understand what homosexuality actually is because I sense an awful lot of people don't, they still think of it as somehow evidence of moral turpitude, they see it as evidence of moral laxity. Norman Tebbit thinks that every homosexual is a paedophile, is a closet paedophile, and he is entitled to his view but it's not one I or I believe any decent person shares. Baroness Young believes homosexuality may be tolerated but is clearly inferior as a lifestyle, in my view the words inferiority or superiority are completely irrelevant to the argument because people don't choose to be gay or to be straight."

Question: Do you see a contradiction in the Conservative Party's "respect for people of different sexual orientation" and its support for Section 28?

Steve Norris: "Well, I personally have made no secret of the fact that I believe the party should not support the retention of Section 28 and that if it genuinely believes that there is a need to protect children from predatory sexual overtures presumably from either a heterosexual or homosexual kind it should look again at the statute book to decide whether there is some effective legislation that may be necessary because quite clearly Section 28 has not been effective. I'm sorry to say that none of this is even newsworthy anymore because I've made my position on this matter well known. William Hague justifies his position by arguing that Section 28 is not discriminatory against gay people it merely protects children, he is of course entitled to his view."

Question: Following on from the backlash over Ann Widdecombe's zero tolerance approach to cannabis - half the shadow cabinet have tried it - even a survey showed that senior accountants have tried it - in these circumstances would you rule out the possibility of the Conservative Party ever agreeing to a Royal Commission to look into a review over the law on soft drugs?

Steve Norris: "This is one of those questions I really don't want to answer because I don't want in any way to tread on territory for which I have no responsibility for in the Tory Party, I'm a vice chairman of the Party, if that question were asked to me normally I would refer it to Ann and to the Home Affairs team to discuss. I tell you what I think publicly about the whole issue as someone who unfortunately can honestly say he never did because when I was at university - Worcester College at Oxford in 1963 to 1965 inclusive I never ever came across it, had I done I'm pretty sure I'd have tried it as that's what you did. Ask me whether I was ever blind drunk to the point of being sick on the pavement, ask me whether I smoked an unhealthy number of cigarettes - yes both of those, I'm not sure we were anymore a desirable bunch of academic yobbos than as we would have all been high on pot, we'd have probably been a lot less trouble to a lot more people but from the point of view of the debate I have a lot of strong views in this debate which surprise people as I have worked with drug addiction and rehabilitation and actually founded two of the largest clinics which now offer real rehabilitation to drug addicts and I know there is hardly a patient we ever treat who didn't start with cannabis.

So given that cannabis is illegal my own personal view is that it's actually quite dangerous to think about decriminalising it, not because that act of itself would alter massively but it would alter perceptions. Its rather like the age of consent issue, and my personal belief is the age of consent for all sexual activities would be thirty along with the age of marriage because people make all sorts of horrendous mistakes, but actually its not - if its already 16 for heterosexual sex then the argument for those of us like me who believes in an equal age of consent is because we believe in equality not because we think the age itself is desperately relevant. I know that my view on that is shared by an awful lot of people and I would have ideally liked the age to be 18 for any form of sexual intercourse only because of the dangers that people point to in every aspect, but I believe more in equality. Talking about this issue, what the signal would be if you decriminalised would be that Government has concluded that something which was not alright is alright and it would be an open invitation to a great many people to get into something that frankly we don't scientifically, medically or socially or criminologically understand sufficiently well and I think it would be a really unfortunate day.

So no I don't personally want to make a great issue out of cannabis because nobody in the drugs field thinks that cannabis is a real issue but as it happens I'm against decriminalisation. And whether it's a Royal Commission or not we are having a debate and I'm going to make a party political point, we can have that debate in the Tory Party, in the Labour Party you are told its not an appropriate question to ask, its becoming quite clear to me over the last six months watching the two parties that you can have debates in the Tory Party which are not permitted in the Labour Party, there's a vague Stalinist whiff there that real democrats in the Labour Party ought to start worrying about."