CSM EDITORIAL
The Daily Telegraph’s Allister Heath did not hold back in his column on Wednesday:
Welcome to anti-democratic Britain, where the beleaguered majority is increasingly subject to the whims of an entitled, activist elite that often seems to despise the people over which it exercises so much power….”
Meanwhile an Ipsos survey for London’s Evening Standard found that 76 per cent think Britain as a place to live is getting worse with 43 per cent agreeing that Labour is ready to form the next government, with 37 per cent disagreeing – similar figures since the start of this year. Rishi Sunak gets his lowest satisfaction rating as Prime Minister, with 63 per cent dissatisfied and just 26 per cent satisfied, Sir Keir Starmer is seen as the “most capable PM” by 36 per cent to Mr Sunak’s 31 per cent, having been neck-and-neck in May and March. 39 per cent agree that Sir Keir is ready to be PM, with 37 per cent disagreeing, the first time he has a net positive score on this question. So, Sir Keir’s satisfaction figure is unchanged on 31 per cent, but dissatisfieds are up four points to 53 per cent.
Depressing stuff.
Undoubtedly the country feels the need for a change. You can smell it in the air. The Tories, in power since 2010, look and act tired.
But don’t ever pay much attention to polls – as Ed Miliband found in 2015, there are plenty of shy Tories around who will tell pollsters one thing just to get off the phone. They will hold onto nanny, voting Conservative at a General Election, telling others that they did not vote, or voted Lib Dem for a change.
What’s in store for the rest of this decade?
Fortunately, British politics is fairly simple to divine. The modern Conservative Party was founded by Robert Peel in 1834. Since then, most of those who’ve had the vote in England have generally voted for it while most of those who have had the vote in Scotland and Wales have usually voted for their various rivals. Since 1900, when Labour was formed, the party has only won eight out of 32 general elections — Labour governments have represented rare interludes punctuating what have been solid periods of Tory rule. A rare interlude awaits …
Starmer seems a shoo-in for 2024/5. So how should he be seen?
From a Tory perspective, Sir Keir Starmer is practically one of them. As DPP he used to attend their think tanks. There he found common ground on counter terror policy and, like a good Tory, as DPP he locked up thousands of dangerous criminals and terrorists. His politics were and are liberal elite Blairite, he’s not a loony zealot like Corbyn. The best thing of all about him is that he’s no Blair, so the electorate will grow tired of him and vote back in a refreshed Conservative government soon enough, especially when he reveals Corbyn acolytes as ministers.
Good for a Conservative rebound, Starmer faces all kinds of problems when he gets in and he’ll likely need Tory support if he’s to get anything done, as a large Labour majority seems far-fetched – even aided by an SNP implosion. It may well be that Starmer is propped up by the Lib Dems and Sir Ed Davey is a good bloke who sensible people can work with – Davey’s another plastic Tory but with mild leftish leanings (likely due to caring for his disabled son; having to rely on the NHS and navigate state assistance programmes for him).
For the Tories this will come as an appropriate period of reset. A time to sever the deadwood. A time to reengage with the traditional support base in the countryside, to embrace some of the popular policies that Reform have come up with – just as UKIP operated as a useful policy creation unit before it went off grid post-Farage.
What the Conservative Party desperately needs is a clear-out, a change of faces, a rejuvenation and an internal reorganisation not seen since the Caplin years – and an embracing of a high-tech, post Brexit series of policies which can make Starmer look clay-footed come 2029. The party will also need a decent round of funding, remembering those key words: go woke go broke (recently demonstrated by the BBC’s recent sharp decline in audience).
The only person who seems to have any other opinion about a spell outside of government is Rishi Sunak. And the tragedy for the Conservative Party (and the country as a whole) is that Sunak is probably, from a getting-the-job-done point of view, the best prime minister since Thatcher. He’s a great manager, a slogger and he’s highly capable. Sunak’s problem is the way he climbed the slippery pole and the way he’s seen by the people – as lightweight, as unelected, as a billionaire who collected the premiership in some inexplicable cash-and-carry putsch during a gilded age of elites and extreme income division.
Those who see Sunak as a WEF shill are as numerous as those who see Starmer as a Savile apologist – tap-tappers who spend their sorry lives downloading conspiracy theories from Bitchute – and should not be taken at all seriously.
The Tories will need to be brutal – as they have been in the past. There will need to be a period of humility and listening. There is no time or excuse for an unelectable interim leader like Hague or Duncan Smith when Sunak’s stay in Number 10 ends. There can be no Boris revival or Trussian experimentation. What is needed is a leader with a fresh face who is malleable enough to be fast-shaped into the next, decade-long Tory PM.
The biggest imminent danger to the Conservative Party is oddly not Starmer, nor is it tactical voting (or Allister Heath’s anticipated rebellion). The biggest danger to the Conservatives this time round is their angry voters staying at home. Which is why, rather than digging up Starmer’s mixed history as DPP or highlighting his dullness, rather than focusing on Corbynites in Starmer’s team or Labour’s inability to determine gender from appendage, Tory strategists’ this time round would be better spent highlighting the need for Tory voters to come out and vote for fear of a large Labour/Lib Dem majority bringing in PR or overturning Brexit.
In fear there’s votes.