Tory battle comes to Gwent

Welsh bookmakers Jack Brown make former chancellor Kenneth Clarke the narrow favourite, but an Argus straw-poll of leading Gwent Tories shows that in the party's upper echelons Mr Duncan Smith is slightly ahead.

Voting papers, which were mailed out on Monday, will be dropping through the door of some 2,500 Gwent Tories this week. The majority of these members live in Monmouth - the only one of 40 Welsh constituencies represented by a directly elected Conservative AM - David Davies. The party has no MPs in Wales.

Acknowledging the importance of Monmouthshire, Mr Duncan Smith will be attending a dinner and question and answer session in the county tonight.

His Welsh tour was due to start in the North this morning, before heading south to Cardiff Bay where David Davies AM will be chauffeuring his preferred candidate around. Mr Davies' father Peter, chairman of the party in South East Wales, is co-ordinating Mr Duncan Smith's campaign in South Wales.

Gwent's other Conservative AM, William Graham, has also declared his support for Mr Duncan Smith and is one of a dozen Gwent vice-presidents of the IDS (as he is becoming known) campaign.

From the bay and a meeting with AMs, Mr Duncan Smith will head for dinner in Usk. The Tory leadership race began immediately after the general election when William Hague announced his intention to stand down. Of the five candidates who expressed an interest in the post three - Michael Portillo, Michael Ancram and David Davis - were eliminated in a series of votes among Tory MPs. The final two are now subject to a one-member-one-vote ballot over the next two weeks.

More than 300,000 ballot papers have been distributed across the UK. The defining issue of the campaign so far has been Europe. While many supporters of Mr Duncan Smith acknowledge Mr Clarke is more popular with the wider electorate, it is his Euro-friendly stance on the question of a single currency that prevents many from backing him.