Comments on: What next for the Right?

By: The Sharpener » Blog Archive » Directions

The Sharpener » Blog Archive » Directions — Thu, 11 May 2006 20:57:16 +0000

[…] Meanwhile, my leader did the honourable, traditional, upstanding, thoroughly Conservative thing, and fell on his sword. Over the weekend, we’ve seen the left wing of my party, the modernists, the children of Portillo, strike the first blow in the leadership fight. Blue Labour have moved early. It is looking like moves to change the voting rules will be made to prevent party members voting on their preferred candidate, who would almost certainly be David Davis. I think that a lurch to the left would be as disastrous for the party as a lurch to the right, and my preferred solution would be a dream ticket partnership of moderniser and right-winger as PM and Chancellor, in either order, but sharing policy duties in a similar manner to Blair-Brown. The way forward for the right, as I’ve argued before, and as Blimpish hinted at in his post, is to build a coalition. All of us are stronger than some of us, or something like that. We do have work to do, it will take time, it won’t be easy, but it is necessary, and it will be good for the party and the country. We don’t have to abandon what makes us conservative in the process of winning power. I’m happy to start the ball rolling on this front, as the party needs some unity in the coming 9 (?) months. I’d love to jump into bed with the modernisers. I’m an old fashioned classical liberal at heart. I believe in low taxes, free markets and economic conservatism. I don’t care what you do in the bedroom, I don’t care what you eat, drink, smoke, inject, sleep with or marry, so on the face of it I should be a Tory moderniser. I would love the party to be what Blimpish called The Liberty Option, because it’s what I passionately believe in, but it shouldn’t become that because I know that a libertarian-strong Tory party, or a Blue Labour soft-left alternative Tory party would be unelectable. I would love us to be that party, but we don’t live in that country. All it takes is for an illegal immigrant to murder a policeman, or a baby to die from MRSA on a crowded, dirty hospital ward, or for just one too many people to lose their job because the economy aint what it used to be, and the two best read dead-tree rags will be begging Blair to come back. The problem with libertarianism is people. They’re perfectly happy with freedom when everything is rosy. When it all goes wrong, they want to know what you’re going to do about it. If we want to take power, we have to take it for a generation. We need to make huge, far-reaching changes, and 4 years between Labour governments isn’t going to allow that. We can keep a lot of what makes us Tories, but we each have to compromise on some ideology and some beliefs. So that’s the state of the Tory party. People who know me well call me a cynic, but really I’m pessimistic about the present and optimistic about the future. When you look at how far we, as people, have come in just a hundred years, it’s hard not to be. […]

By: The Sharpener » Directions

The Sharpener » Directions — Mon, 09 May 2005 20:06:13 +0000

[…] es in a similar manner to Blair-Brown. The way forward for the right, as I’ve argued before, and as Blimpish hinted at in his post, is to build a coalition. All of us are stronger than some of us, […]

By: Katie

Katie — Fri, 06 May 2005 11:47:53 +0000

You know, I agree with the libertarian thing, and I don’t mind them not being electable, because I think it takes a long time to build into a party people can be proud of voting for. But yes, in a terrible callous way, Thatcherism will only become truly libertarian once the lady herself has left us (and I don’t just mean for Venice) and the party faithful are no longer weeing themselves with worry that she’ll disapprove of them. Interestingly, here in France, and back in the States, all major leaders get an ism. Jospinie, Chiraquie, Reaganism, Clintonism and so on, but here in Britain, we have Thatcherism, and Blairites. Nobody can even contemplate “howard-ism” can they? We are more reticent with our baptism of political philosophies.

By: EU Serf

EU Serf — Fri, 06 May 2005 10:44:04 +0000

Clarke was needed in the Shadow Cabinet but not as leader. As a Europhile he would have split the party again. That said only a stupid party wastes people of talentwhen they has such a shallow pool to draw from.

By: Edward

Edward — Fri, 06 May 2005 07:00:48 +0000

You are spot on. We need to explain why the right can be good for the whole country and stand up for ourselves in a respectable manner. Then the world is our oyster.

By: Blimpish

Blimpish — Fri, 06 May 2005 01:27:10 +0000

Damn. Had the knives all sharpened and ready to go.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Thu, 05 May 2005 22:10:16 +0000

If that Beeb exit poll is right, we might just put the meltdown, rethink, and backstabbing session on hold.

By: 2005 UK General Election » General election blog roundup 25 - D-Day

2005 UK General Election » General election blog roundup 25 - D-Day — Thu, 05 May 2005 20:37:22 +0000

[…] 220;what happens next speculation” even before the polls have closed, with pondering Where next for the Right? and your roundupmonkey for tonight desperately trying to start up a campaign for elec […]

By: Jim Bliss

Jim Bliss — Thu, 05 May 2005 20:15:36 +0000

In my view the economy will be in serious trouble by the time of the next election, owing primarily to high oil prices. The only question is whether or not the tories are still a credible party by then.

By: Monjo

Monjo — Thu, 05 May 2005 18:01:28 +0000

If the economy does well and the country, then the Conservatives may have a long wait for power. As Brits we must want the country to do well; the problem the Conservatives have is they need to persuade people that whilst the country is ticking along alright under Labour – it would be growing at a faster rate under them, and life would be better. However, people still remember the ERM pull-out and the recession.