Conservative Party Deletes Internet Archive of Speeches and Promises

The Conservative Party have attempted to delete all their speeches and press releases online from the past 10 years, including one in which David Cameron promises to use the internet to make politicians "more accountable".

The Tory party have deleted the backlog of speeches from the main website and the Internet Archive - which aims to make a permanent record of websites and their content - between 2000 and May 2010.

The party has also removed the record of the past speeches from search engines, according to Computer Weekly.

The magazine condemned the party for attempting to hide their speeches in the same "secretive corner of the internet [as] those that shelter the military, secret services, gangsters and paedophiles".

The party has been accused of attempting to delete all records of their previous promises before next year's general election. Former Labour deputy prime minister Lord Prescott tweeted: "How do Tories stop being accused of breaking election promises? By DELETING all pre 2010 speeches & press releases!"

Labour MP for Edinburgh East Sheila Gilmore added: "It will take more than David Cameron pressing delete to make people forget about his broken promises and failure to stand up for anyone beyond a privileged few."

The party has dismissed these claims and said it was just an attempt to clean up the site.

Computer Weekly said that since it raised the issue with the San Francisco-based Internet Archive, some of the speeches have started to reappear online.

Among the speeches which were deleted by the party include promises to make the internet more transparent in order to "bridge the gap" between government and voters.

The speeches include Cameron's homily to the Google Zeitgeist Europe Conference in 2006 that "by making more information available to more people, you are giving them more power" as spotted by the Guardian.

Other speeches taken offline include the Conservative's Big Society manifesto, a core policy in their 2010 election campaign, and a promise by Chancellor George Osborne in 2006 to increase state spending by 2% for the next three years.

A Conservative spokesman said: "We are making sure our website keeps the Conservative Party at the forefront of political campaigning.

"These changes allow people to quickly and easily access the most important information we provide - how we are clearing up Labour's economic mess, taking the difficult decisions and standing up for hardworking people."