At the General Election, the Conservatives were reduced to a rump of 121 out of 650 MPs. If we consider Reform, or at least their voters as belonging to the centre-right too, then we are still only looking at 126 seats. However, that’s one part of the story. Whilst barely 24% of the electorate voted Conservative, 39% voted for the Conservatives and Reform combined. This means that more people actually voted for the Tories or to express their frustration at the Tories failure to deliver on their own policy promises and values especially around taxation and immigration.
Having said that, I do not believe that Reform offer the right solution for the centre-right. Now, I do not believe that they are fascist as some people suggest. Nor do I think that Nigel Farage is personally, actively racist, just as I do not believe that Jeremy Corbyn was consciously antisemitic. However, just as Corbyn allowed a culture to grow where antisemitism was permitted, so too Reform because of the specific way they approach the immigration issue attract to their cause those who thrive is a culture that is hostile to immigrants, treats them as alien/a threat and so allows racism to take hold. For those reasons, I don’t think that Reform should be considered centre-right. I also would strongly advice Christians to stay clear.
When I say that Reform are not the answer, I don’t just mean that the Tories would be unwise to merge or form an alliance with them. I also mean that they should ignore the temptation to focus solely or primarily on Reform, seeking to rival them going forward. The reason for this is simple. It would involve making the mistake of attempting to fight the last election instead of the next one when the time comes.
Conservatives need to remember three things. First, that the seats where Reform did particularly well were traditionally Labour seats and 2019 successes in those areas masked the way in which the Tories had lost a lot of support in their traditional heartlands. It was this that both Labour and the Lib Dems took advantage of in 2019. The Conservatives risk repeating their 2017 strategy in 2029, pursuing those red wall voters without holding onto or recovering other historically centre-right voters.
Secondly, the Rwanda policy is now well and truly dead and buried. No-one is likely to sign such a deal with Britain again. Indeed, there is a risk that other, more acceptable and practical third party processing options may now be off the table as Starmer has in effect well and truly shredded any residual reputation Britain has as a reliable international partner. I think that was an unforced error. I’d have quietly let the policy die by making minimal use of it whilst developing other options. All this means is that it is pointless for the Tories to gripe about Rwanda or promising to bring it back. They need to grieve the policy and move on.
One of three things will happen over the next few years, either Labour’s plans will work. They’ll stop the boats and bring migration under control, we will see the figures falling as part of a natural cycle or Labour’s approach will spectacularly fail and so it will be for the Tories to make sure they and not Reform capitalise on this.
However, this brings me to my third point. If Reform are the ones who capitalise on immigration in 2029, then providing the Tories have built up a new support base, it is primarily Labour who will suffer that time around. Reform may well be able to turn some of those second places into wins. If the Tories don’t recover in time, then we may see more of an even four way division of seats next time between Labour, the Conservatives, Reform and the Lib Dems. However, I still remain sceptical about Reform’s ability to break through. Their vote share is similar to UKIPS 2015 total and I think Farage’s power’s are over-hyped.
The Conservative’s most immediate challenge is going to be that Labour will be stoking up the narrative that “things are even worse than we thought, now we’ve looked at the books.” They’ll want to blame the Tories for as much as possible. Every failure in the next few years will be pinned on Boris, Liz and Rishi, whilst every success will be Labours. The Conservatives cannot afford for that narrative to take hold. This was of course Ed Miliband’s failure in 2010 and William Hague’s in 1997. The reality even back then was that Blair inherited a growing economy with low taxes and plenty of scope to invest into education and healthcare. Major had also done a lot of the heavy lifting towards peace in Northern Ireland. Alistair Darling in 2010 had also done a lot of hard work in preparing the way for restoring public finances after the Credit Crunch,
So, whenever there is a good news story, falling inflation, economic growth, reduction in net migration, improvements to NHS waiting lists etc, then shadow ministers need to resist the temptation to be sceptical and cynical about good news. They should welcome the good news, acknowledge that Starmer’s successes are good news for all of us but also gently point out how their policies back in 2023 and early 2024 made these things possible.
The big challenge for the Conservatives though is not the short term. Indeed, their biggest problem is that from 2015 onwards they abandoned the Cameron/Osborne long term strategy to renew their party. The Tories have a demographic crisis with their voter base being increasingly older and smaller. By pursuing the Red Wall-Brexit vote, the Conservatives under May , Johnson and Sunak postponed hard decisions for short term gain.
If the centre-right is to survive, whether under the Conservative name or something different, then it needs to renew itself and it desperately needs to develop an argument that resonates with younger voters. At this stage, this does not mean coming up with a long list of new policies nor does it mean abandoning centre-right principles and values, especially around national security, free markets, low taxation and controlled inflation.
What it does mean is that they need to develop cogent arguments to show why Conservatism can be attractive to younger generations. This means emphasising the ethical and compassionate benefits of free market approaches to responding to poverty, it means not allowing the left a monopoly on green principles[1] and it means that they need to develop a different narrative on Brexit.
I’m a Euro-sceptic by conviction and so supported leave when given the choice, although I’m not convinced that there was overwhelming demand at the time. However, the form that Brexit took, focused heavily on immigration control and became inward and backward looking. Alternative visions for Brexit can allow for freedom of trade and movement and a much more internationalist flavour.
The Conservatives, most of all need to recover their reputation for competency. This will be hard to do given that they no longer have power and have even lost a lot of their local government and mayoral responsibilities. So, they will have to learn how to project that image by how they conduct themselves, including in the leadership election.
[1] The Tories are at times to political ideas what England is to sports. They pioneer something (remember Margaret Thatcher being an early voice warning about climate change) before allowing others to take it over and do better!
Faithroots 