I can already feel that the Tory leadership race is gonna give me an ulcer, because of the number of people on the centre and left who have neither read a history book nor the news saying things like “hopefully the Tory party will move to the right”.
Having an alternative to labour that doesn’t scare the bejesus out of me were they in govt. is to be fully wished for. Other places are showing what happens when complacency and assuming elections are *always* won from the centre ignores what long-term strategic hard right campaigning can achieve.
I am normally very 🙄 about politics-as-branding but you really, really don't want a hard-right sect wearing the skin of a centuries old political party 20-25% of people will vote for automatically
This seems inevitable which makes me cautiously optimistic about electoral reform.
Labours leadership team have shown a clear eyed ruthlessness which IMO is the only way we get through this unscathed.
It’s hard not to sense a degree of privilege in Chaos Timeline people, sometimes. Like, almost all the ones I know will be Alright Jack in a far right future.
As I’ve seen it, it’s “they’ll marginalise themselves and become electorally irrelevant, so we won’t suffer another Tory government for a long time”.
Like Tories celebrating Corbyn becoming Labour leader. Sort of.
Not saying it’s a good take, just explaining what I think is the “logic” behind it.
Yes, it assumes two things: 1. Tories are bad (and/or I want Labour in government), 2. GEs are won from the centre.
Some truth in each, but taking them as axiomatic suggests a massive failure of imagination. It's got a whiff of Fifth Form Genius about it.
It’s a difficult call for them. Firstly because they need to make an at least in appearance break from their failed government(s) which I’m not sure is possible with any of the likely leadership contenders.
Thirdly, I don’t think a move to the right works because of Farage (who will get vast amounts of attention). Unless of course they ally with Reform - an ostensibly good tactical call but v difficult in practice.
Soooo…if it was me I’d opt for an interim see what happens position which optimises flexibility (eg if Labour fails). On that basis Cleverly is the right choice of leader imv.
Historically, the natural reaction to a catastrophic electoral loss like this is for the tories to slew violently to the right. So I guess amalgamation with the Reform loonies is on the cards!
When they did it in 2001/2005 it was a deliberate 'core votes strategy' to shore up and reassure the base while intentionally setting up to move to the centre when they thought they had a chance, which they did in 2010
This lot don't do strategy, they're going to cargo cult without undertanding
One might hope that "hopefully" is being used here 'correctly' as an adverb rather than as a disjunct. 'The Tories, full of hope, are moving to the right', rather than 'It is to be hoped that the Tories are moving to the right'
But I might be hoping in vain...
one approach would be for all political commentators to agree to devote a mere 10% of their weekly output to this car crash, until it's resolved. the other 90% could be more interestingly deployed focusing on what the new actual government is doing etc
Yeah - I anticipate that Inside Politics will return to the four part shape I designed it to have now we have a government that wants to do things again.
I suspect most reasonable people right now are busy sleeping, dealing with the backlog, and getting ready to crack on with work to fix stuff in the real world. The lovely thing is we don't have to think about Tory party internal politics for a few years. Their next leader will probably be obscure.
Good point. The Tories went through five leaders in the last five years. Patterns and trends suggest they'll go through three leaders in the next five years.
I expect them to pause and recooperate then find a Hauge or IDS character to tide them over. Their membership will be exhausted by it all too. All the loud people will go and focus on the US.
Well, obviously. It would show that the Tories are not Serious, and everyone wants Serious politicians.
It's why Boris Johnson was so soundly defeated by the Liberal Democrats back in 2019!
1. Literally no, I used them in the same point. 2. That point was about 2019, and my overarching point was "lol, no, being Serious doesn't help".
I mean, like, _this_ time the Lib Dems did well: www.theguardian.com/politics/art...
It depends what you want as a final outcome. I want the Tory Party to no longer exist and a new, centre/centre right party, untainted with the last [choose your number] years to be formed to give everyone policy/voting options. The Tory Party has too much baggage.
No, it does not depend on what you want as a final outcome. Anyone hoping to roll the dice that a more rightwing party inhabiting the Conservative party's shell would not manage to take power is playing with fire.
And while I don’t think anyone disputes that Labour winning a thumping landslide on, like, a third of the vote is a product of its centrist positioning, we JUST saw a party win a massive majority with a third of the vote!
Everything is stacked against the tories though? Labours vote share is partly a result of massive tactical voting aimed at wrecking the tories. That’ll happen again, and even if the tories get back 100% of reform voters (no way), that gets them 287 seats. And their voters are dying. They’re toast.
Nah.
They were toast in 1997. They, or something inhabiting their tradition, will rebuild.
And Labour will, at some point, either fuck up massively or run out of steam, all govts do
If the Tories/Reform are a viable alternative, people will vote for them eventually
Mongooses in a sack time. Though if they were in an actual sack we wouldn't need to see them at it. I suppose we'd still hear all the bloody noise, though. So, yes. EXACTLY like mongooses in a sack.
Anyone who says that hasn’t been paying attention for the last five years. (Arguably the Tories might have been seen as centrist until BJ threw the moderates out, but since 2019… 😖)
If the Tory party does head off into the Reform long grass, is there any chance the LibDems can occupy the moderate centre right ground? I feel like the LDs have a bit of a challenge in how they position themselves vs Labour now
I'm trying to fully remember how they came across 1997-2005. I first voted for them at that time and my sense was (as much more of a libertarian than now) that they stood broadly against the perception of Lab as socially authoritarian. Unsure if Starmer's Lab will create the same perception.
I guess austerity had an impact on this, but the number of people who would rather have an absolute nightmare with some relief every 10 years rather than a mild disappointment every election is wild.
The correct wish is "hopefully the Tory party will splinter into at least two factions, none of which has a hope of winning any form of power for the next 25 years" but unfortunately that relies on Tories hating each other more than they crave power and influence.
'Surely going Reform-lite is the wrong move'
Yeah if only there was precedent for a party led by Nigel Farage basically collapsing and that delivering almost all their votes to the Tories
Do you not think we're in a situation of "inevitably the Tory party will move to the right" ?!?
Actually not sure I want an answer to this, it's the hope that kills ya.
Maybe we are, maybe we aren’t, but “inevitably” and “hopefully” are not the same thing. (And no, I don’t think it is inevitable because the parliamentary party has been moved left by the vagaries of who got re-elected)
Ah! I was waiting for some analysis of the new relative ideological middle of the Conservative MPs - a leftwards shift is fascinating. Guess a lot of the defeated 2019 intake had helped move it further rightwards?
I think also being less rightwing actively helped - like, a lot of the narrow Con holds against the Lib Dems are ones where you’ve squeezed the Labour vote down to its 2010 and 2005 core, but the Con vote has only really shifted to Reform and not to its left.
