Filling a vacuum in a post-Brexit world with thoughtful centre-right political commentary from a senior political adviser who is founder of an international marketing and media relations consultancy.
I am at the Tories’ party conference in Manchester this week, so it’s a quick Tuesday blog. Why am I here, you might ask? I grew up near Manchester, and I like the city. It is booming, no thanks to Andy Burnham.
As for the Tories, they are almost endearing… a small, actually quite happy band of people who are luxuriating in their irrelevance. Bars are mostly half empty, hotels are easy to book, and commercial stands at the conference are sparse, but the vibe is, well, comfortable.
In terms of hard politics, there isn’t any. Most think Badenoch will be gone by May. James Cleverly seems to have missed his chance, and that just leaves Jenrick as the next leader, giving a slightly weird speech today in his desperate need for the top job. He is clearly a fraud who will drive the few remaining moderates into the arms of the LibDems. But nobody seems to care. Who has heard of any of the other front benchers?
Mel Stride, the decent Shadow Chancellor, has managed to persuade his colleagues that it is the economy, stupid, but his policies are drowned out by immigration. The Tories now advocate leaving the ECHR and mass deportations. Hopeless.
A Reform-lite approach is a road to nowhere. Add to this, you now can’t be a parliamentary candidate unless you believe this rubbish. What happened to freedom of thought/speech so beloved of the hard-right? The circular firing squad is now fully in place. A recipe for mediocre candidates, the quality of which is already in decline, advocates of policies which either repel, or in some voters’ eyes don’t go far enough, is now being served to the electorate.
A once great party humbled, in a deep hole, handing out shovels to its few remaining supporters to keep digging. Never mind. it is easy to get to a bar and order a drink at conference nowadays. Happy irrelevance indeed…
As I head back to London from NYC, my week over here has confirmed Trump is running rampant. This time he is also well organised. With a clean sweep of Congress politics is moving to the extremes confirmed by Trump’s Cabinet post picks which are quite frankly extraordinary. Here are just a few of them:
Kristi Noem – Homeland Security Secretary. Famed for boasting about shooting her dog in a recent auto-biography, she is as hard right as you could get and will have sweeping powers to deport.
Pete Hegseth – Defense Secretary barring an alleged sexual harassment case. A former Fox News host and army veteran, he believes women should have no combat role.
Matt Gaetz – Attorney General. This appointment has shocked even Trump supporters. He is facing allegations of sex crimes, is in favour of defunding the FBI and would literally destroy legal structures in the US. Uniformly loathed, many people didn’t even know he had any legal qualifications.
Elon Musk/Vivek Ramaswamy – joint heads of a newly created Department of Government Efficiency. The latter, former Republican nominee contender is just ridiculous, and Musk with billions in government contracts can’t move without tripping over a potential conflict of interest.
The list goes on. A fracking champion in charge of energy, an anti-vaxxer in charge of health, and a Putin sympathiser in charge of the intelligence agencies…
Politics is going to get very ugly here but America voted for it…
Trump’s intentions are clear. There will be no safe guards in place to rein him in. The only modest bright spot is John Thune winning the leadership of the Senate. An establishment Republican, he might bring some sanity to proceedings, but bearing in mind Trump will lead by terrorising any opposition, one doubts it.
The agenda is set, and America voted for it. Mass deportations, the slate of all Trump’s legal woes wiped clean, massive tax cuts with the rich getting richer, environmental regulations torn up, and vendettas pursued against any perceived enemy of Trump. Overseas, Ukraine sold out, Taiwan under greater threat, Israel allowed to run rampant and tariffs ending global free trade, in the process driving up inflation. Oh, and the Trump family and its allies preening themselves with their noses firmly in the public trough. Politics is going to get very ugly here.
As for the Democrats, their defeat is entirely their fault. Too much noise about identity politics, failing to grip illegal immigration, extremists within their ranks undermining law and order by stripping the police of powers and/or funds such as in San Francisco. Despite Biden’s decency and some policy successes, in the campaign they had nothing to say to those who should have been their core voting base. Add to that Biden stepping down too late to allow a competitive race for the Democratic nominee, and their defeat was sealed. Patronising interventions from former Democrat presidents and ridiculous endorsements from celebrities as a substitute for policy hardly helped either.
Grounds for optimism? For all the Republicans’ success, this country is pretty much split 50/50 in vote share. Hard right MAGA extremists are only polling at 6%. The rest of Trump supporters are mostly just frustrated with government and, often, rightly so. Such is the scale of the Democrats’ defeat, they must surely reform themselves. The last president to shrink the size of government was actually Clinton, who took 400,000 off the government payroll so they can change their spots. Trump only has 4 years left and may blow up well before then. Musk is already rubbing people up the wrong way, and some nominations are even shocking core Republican supporters.
Lastly, as I gladly return to London, for all of Labour’s faults, with the rise of the populist Right across democracies, the UK looks a bastion of stability and must surely embrace closer European integration… so, not all bad then…
There has been no blog for the past few weeks. The trajectory of politics has been pretty predictable and there has been nothing to add; the gradual demise of today’s Tories, the rise of Trump and the truly vile anti-West right-wing Republicans, the permanence of Putin and populism on the march in Europe.
But having spent some time with senior Tories recently, the sheer disaster awaiting them at the next Election is clearly coming into view and they know they can do nothing about it. This will be no 1992 all over again. The Tories will be routed and 1997 may evoke fond memories for them in comparison.
Ah, I hear people say, there is no appetite for Starmer. It doesn’t matter. The public is so heartedly sick of the Tories, Labour will storm it whether it is partly due to Tories staying at home (similar to 1997) or the rise of Reform UK or the rise of the LibDems in the South or the collapse of the SNP in the North.
Interestingly, Sky News do a tracking poll of 33 voters who voted Tory in 2019. Nine are switching to Labour and five to Reform. On this small sample alone, the Tory vote will be down by over 40%. Interesting, really, that we seem to be the only major democracy currently moving mostly to the left even if it is without enthusiasm.
Holding a sword… a key attribute apparently to becoming the next Tory leader…
But it can hardly be surprising. The behaviour of senior Tories is appalling, now contemplating another change at the top from the decent if increasingly politically hapless Sunak. Penny Mordaunt is the next sacrificial lamb mooted as leader, her key merit being she held a sword aloft very well at the Coronation. You really can’t write the script…
To some extent it is Sunak’s fault. He is no Tory left-winger but in trying to ingratiate himself with the Right he has simply earned their contempt. He should have stood up to them from the start. If they felt Johnson and Truss were ok why did he think they would ever accept him? Let them clear off to Reform if they have to. It will ultimately be a political dead-end.
The only silver lining, first highlighted by the excellent Stephen Bush in the FT, is that post-election there is a small chance the Tories move to the centre-ground as right-wingers amongst the grassroots head elsewhere. Certainly, analysis shows the parliamentary party will not move much to the Right in composition if it is defenestrated. Umm…, I am not so sure. It partly takes ruthlessness from moderates to seize control of the Tory Party and there is currently no evidence they are up for the fight.
Hey ho. It feels like an exciting year ahead politically but one where no one really gets what they want!
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