"A Tory government is all but inevitable" - Jenni Russell in The Guardian (3 March)

[Apollo11]

A very interesting article that I partly sympathize with. But if you are voting in the UK then how you vote has to be decided in the context of the choice of candidates standing in your constituency. It would be very rare that the Conservative Party candidate was the most liberal/progressive option. So actively supporting "centrist" Tories would be a self-destructive option for any self-respecting liberal-minded citizen.


We will all suffer if Cameron's brand of Conservatism fails

A Tory government is all but inevitable. The left is best served by engaging with the policies of a leader still open to ideas

Jenni Russell The Guardian, Tuesday 3 March 2009

For 30 years anyone who thought themselves vaguely on the left has been able to rail against the nastiness of Conservatism. We deplored their devotion to the interests of the rich, their worship of the market, their callous indifference towards all those who couldn't flourish in their cruel, competitive world. We detested their xenophobia, racism, sexism and snobbery. We knew, from grim experience, how willing they were to let schools and hospitals crumble and public spaces become sad and fearful. We exhorted them to abandon their disgraceful politics - while remaining comfortably certain that they never would.

Well, now they're trying. There is a real battle going on within the Tories over the party's identity. A small group of determined people at the top is trying to pull the party behind some version of green, progressive, or compassionate conservatism. Its members are doggedly establishing the Conservatives in the centre, and sometimes the centre-left, of the political battleground. And yet, far from welcoming the fact that our political futures could lie in this more civilised territory, much of the left and its commentators are furiously trying to undermine or ridicule this move.

(...)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/mar/03/conservatives-david-cameron-politics

[T_i_B]

1. Well this is the thing for me...

how you vote has to be decided in the context of the choice of candidates standing in your constituency

That much is true and for me the local Tories are dreadful, regardless of where they are on the political spectrum. However, I'm not about to go in for tactical voting, which I consider to be dishonest and tending to result in second raters being voted in.

Are the Tories inevitable at the next general election? Well that depends on events. It's worth noting that whilst people may be fed up with labour there is not much enthusiasm for Cameron's conservatives either and the polls since 2005 have been volatile.

If anything it's probably more worthwhile at present to look at the likely outcomes of the European and County Council elections this year, neither of which are likely to go well for the left. Better that then to be getting ahead of ourselves or joining in with some ridiculous speculation about a snap election.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. You can't blame anyone for hesitating about a claim of 'compassionate conservatism' from a leader

You're right, at an individual candidate level, the Tory will practically never be the most liberal/progressive/favoured-adjective one. Occasionally, you might find one with advanced environmental views (eg Zac Goldsmith is standing for them in Richmond-on-Thames, though that's held by Lib Dem Susan Kramer at the moment).

And even if you think Camerons and his supporters at the top of the party would be a passable government if given the right encouragement (which is what Jenni Russell seems to be saying), then, unless your local Tory is one of that supporters' group and is in a marginal seat, there's not much point in voting Conservative. Voting for an identikit, unreconstructed Tory, who would, if elected, put pressure on Cameron in the wrong direction, as opposed to a Labour or Lib Dem (or SNP etc.) MP who would make his majority smaller, would undercut any centrist tendency that Cameron might genuinely have. But given Cameron's background in PR, I still have doubts that his centrism is anything more than cosmetic.

[Anarcho-Socialist]

3. I don't buy it either

The dominance of the progressive wing of the party can't be taken for granted. It is a fragile thing, and if it is to succeed it needs constructive criticism. I asked two insiders how many people in the party were fully behind this new Toryism. "Ten," said one, "but it's an important ten." Another said grimly: "Twenty-two - the shadow cabinet." Standing behind the more socially responsible Conservatives are plenty of gin-drinking, Mail-reading Tories nostalgic for the harshness of Thatcherism. They would cheer, along with the left, if this experiment failed.

Opposition parties talking left in opposition is nothing new, and judging the few economic proposals of the current Opposition I think the proposed 'Red Toryist' trend in the Tory Party to be very overstated. I doubt Cameron to be significantly Red Tory in philosophy, he's a Thatcher boy who's following the Blair path of PR.

The most recent 'moderate' to lead the Tory Party was John Major and he constantly struggled with the right-wing backbenchers and the right-wing party-at-large. Any subsequent attempt to lead the Tory Party to the middle would provoke a rebellion in a Parliamentary party which is as right-wing (as well as the party at large) as it was 15 years ago.