Heresy of the week: There’s only one political divide that really matters and you’re probably on the wrong side of it

Is the Economist rightwing or leftwing? On its website, the magazine – or newspaper as it prefers to style itself – tries to clear up the confusion:

• “Some readers, particularly those used to the left-right split in most democratic legislatures, are bamboozled by The Economist’s political stance. We like free enterprise and tend to favour deregulation and privatisation. But we also like gay marriage, want to legalise drugs and disapprove of monarchy.”

In other words, the publication is both economically and socially liberal. Nothing remarkable about that – it is an increasingly common political stance these days, especially among the chattering classes where it provides the only socially acceptable alternative to lefty liberalism.

What annoys many on the right, however, is that the magazine sometimes endorses parties and politicians of the centre-left over perfectly respectable centre-right alternatives. For instance, Tim Montgomerie (in a diary for the Australian edition of the Spectator) had this to say when the Economist backed Kevin Rudd over Tony Abbott:

• “It did so because it cannot tolerate any socially conservative candidates even though the greatest of economists, Adam Smith, would recognise that all successful markets depend upon strong and stable social institutions and the values they generate.”

The Economist’s own account is that it is “drawn to centrist politicians and parties who appear to combine the best of both sides, such as Tony Blair, whose combination of social and economic liberalism persuaded it to endorse him at the 2001 and the 2005 elections.”

Well, that seems reasonable. If your values are primarily liberal, rather than primarily leftwing or rightwing, why shouldn’t you opt for the candidate you believe to be closest to your values?

Yet this lofty evenhandedness presumes an equivalence between the ‘unreliability’ of the mainstream right on social liberalism and that of the mainstream left on economic liberalism. This won’t wash. Across the western world all societies are heading towards greater license and away from traditional moral norms. Not even the Republicans in America are going to change that. By way of contrast, economic liberalism most certainly is under threat – not from the old left’s fondness for nationalisation, but from the new left’s drive towards an evermore indebted public sector.

To get what’s really going on with the Economist, we have to consider the most important political divide of them all – which is between those who believe that humanity is fallible in every respect (proper conservatives) and those who don’t (everybody else).

Only conservatism – true conservatism, that is – sees that the flaws in human nature compromise everything that we do and think. This is a hard truth to accept, which is why almost all of us carve out exceptions and place them on a pedestal they don’t deserve. For leftwingers the exception is the state. For rightwingers the exceptions might include the market, the ‘wisdom of crowds’ or the limitless exploitability of the environment. For refined liberals, however, the state and the market are mere tools – to be used and set aside according to rational criteria.

Therefore, to understand the Economist you need to realise that the thing it places on the pedestal isn’t the market, but human reason. Certainly this explains why the magazine should be so instinctively hostile to the presence of real conservatism, which empties the pedestal of all human endeavour.

Germany’s eurosceptics dare to be different

The outcome of the forthcoming German general election could be determined by the performance of a new eurosceptic political party called the Alternative for Germany (AfD).

It's tempting to describe the AfD as Germany’s UKIP, but its leaders have made it clear that they have more in common with the British Conservative Party than with Nigel Farage and friends. Furthermore, while the AfD wants an end to the Eurozone, it supports Germany’s continued membership of a reformed European Union.

Despite a policy platform that would be considered wholly unremarkable in a British context, the AfD is the target of sustained abuse in Germany – some of it violent. Friederike Heine reports on recent events for Spiegel Online:

• “Bernd Lucke [the AfD’s leader] is among the most controversial figures in Germany. His political agenda – which includes an ‘orderly dissolution’ of the euro, a decentralized European Union and a move towards Swiss-style, direct democracy – is often met with doubt, and sometimes outright hostility.
• “Last week, left-wing agitators stormed the stage at an Alternative for Germany (AfD) campaign event, pushing Lucke to the ground and using pepper spray on several campaigners. The attack came as little surprise, though, after a confrontation with Green Youth activists earlier this month prompted the AfD to apply for police protection on its campaign trail.”

The pressure hasn’t just come from leftwing rentamobs, but also from the mainstream media:

• “This spring, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper ran a piece on the hidden ties between the AfD and members of the right-wing extremist National Democratic Party (NPD). The AfD's stance on Europe, a Berlin NPD official told the paper, was closer to NPD policies ‘than any other established party in Germany.’ Other German newspapers have taken a similar line.”

Might these newspapers have a point? The facts would suggest that they don’t:

• “Suspicions that the AfD may be moving into right-wing extremist territory were put into question last week, however. An Internet study published by linkfluence – a Franco-German social media monitoring company – shows that there is little or no overlap between the AfD's politics and those of the right-wing extremist NPD.
• “The study, which was overseen by the company's German chief executive Oliver Tabino, consists of two parts: an analysis of AfD and NPD supporters' Facebook ‘likes,’ and an evaluation of hyperlinks to and from the AfD's various regional party websites.
• “The Facebook analysis shows that supporters of the AfD and those of the NPD have little in common.”

Despite this evidence, the criticism of the AfD continues. For instance, in her otherwise fair and balanced article, Friederike Heine argues that “by advocating a break from consensus-oriented politics and decrying political correctness as a burden on free speech, the party is aligning itself with other right-wing populist movements across Europe.”

And yet the consensus that the AfD is breaking is on the Eurozone – which is hardly unreasonable in the circumstances. As for its European alignments, the AfD seems closest to David Cameron’s Conservative Party – which, in German eyes, is obviously what counts as a rightwing populist movement.

Heresy of the Week: Middle England is a different place from the Tory heartlands

Andy McDonald, the Labour MP for Middlesbrough, has an article in the New Statesman about Britain’s economic divide. It's pretty partisan stuff, but it does contain an interesting idea. 

McDonald takes the constituencies of the 21 MPs who are full members of the Cabinet and combines them into a single entity called “Cabinetland”. His point is that the Government is led by people who don’t really understand how bad things are, because they represent parts of the country which have dodged the worst of the economic downturn: 

• “In [Cabinetland], unemployment is 2.6 per cent. The number of people claiming Job Seeker’s Allowance is down over nine per cent on last year. Youth unemployment has plummeted by 19 per cent in the last 12 months, and even over-50s unemployment is down. Each constituency has just 300 people unemployed for longer than twelve months.”

Because MPs with safer seats can afford to spend more time on national politics, they tend to climb higher up the greasy pole than colleagues in more marginal constituencies. For this reason, most of Cabinetland is situated deep within the Tory heartlands (the five Lib Dem seats being the obvious exception). 

To win a majority at the next election the Conservatives must win over the swing voters of ‘Middle England’. It is an evocative name, redolent of thatched cottages and country lanes, but it gives a misleading impression. Middle England and the Tory heartlands are not the same place at all. By and large, senior Conservatives do not represent the communities they most need to reach out to.

In a related piece for the New Statesman, Rafael Behr expands on this theme. He warns that ministers risk being led astray by their constituency mail bags:

• “MPs for leafy constituencies say they are mired in frenzied local battles over new developments. The government’s efforts to relax planning regulations earlier this year provoked backbench fury. With Ukip poised to mop up Tory discontent, No 10 is sensitive to the charge of spraying bricks and mortar indiscriminately across the party’s electoral heartland. Once fracking is added to the mix, Cameron and Osborne are easily depicted in a conspiracy against all that is green and pleasant in England.”

It’s easy to dismiss the need for new development when you already have what you want from life:

• “Privately, senior Tories concede that many of their most stalwart supporters have been relatively untroubled by the economic turbulence of recent years. To the retired officer in his Kentish conservatory or the Surrey banker commuting into the City, it hardly felt like there was a crisis at all – at least, until Osborne’s diggers appeared at the bottom of the garden.”

This is, however, a rather over-simplified argument. The implication that it’s only comfortable commuters who object to new development is incorrect. Furthermore, typical Tory voters are hardly immune to the effect of the economic crisis – anyone who relies on interest from their savings could tell you that.  

Nevertheless, Rafael Behr does deliver some home truths:

• “For all the veneration of Thatcher, the Tories are miles away from repeating the Iron Lady’s record of throwing open the doors of stuffy Conservatism to new recruits.”

It is a sad fact that, in Britain today, the rate of home ownership is falling. It is hard to see how this trend can be reversed with house prices on the rise and housebuilding at historically low levels:

• “...in Britain millions of people are being priced out of the middle-class dream. If they see Cameron taking the side of the minority who dodged the recession, they will feel priced out of ever being Tory voters, too.”

Washington has fallen to the political undead – Westminster must not be next

Scattering nuggets of gossip on his way, Christopher Buckley contributes an eye-opening book review for the New York Times. His theme is Washington’s big money politics:

• “Anyone who’s lived in Washington for any length of time, listening to the latest candidate for the nation’s highest office thump the lectern and proclaim he is going to change the way we do business in Washington . . . will yawn. We heard rather a lot about all that in 2008. So, has Washington changed? Or as Sarah Palin would put it, ‘How’s that hopey-changey thing workin’ out for ya?’”

The answer to that is not very well, says Mark Leibovich, whose book This Town, gives Buckley plenty to get stuck into:

• “President Obama’s first year in office was the best year ever for the special interests industry, which earned $3.47 billion lobbying the federal government…”

There always was a lot of money in US politics, but it’s now reaching a whole new level:

• “‘Over the last dozen years,’ Leibovich writes, ‘corporate America (much of it Wall Street) has tripled the amount of money it has spent on lobbying and public affairs consulting in D.C.’ Alongside this money comes the tsunami of dollars from presidential campaigns. He reports that during the 2012 contest, the so-called super PACs and megadonors pumped ‘upwards of $2 billion . . . into the empty-calorie economy of two men destroying each other.’”

But then comes the most shocking statistic of the lot:

• “There’s a phrase in journalism-speak called ‘burying the lede,’ which Leibovich appears to do by waiting until Page 330 to cite this arresting figure (previously reported by The Atlantic): in 1974, 3 percent of retiring members of Congress became lobbyists. ‘Now 50 percent of senators and 42 percent of congressmen do.’ No one goes home anymore. Cincinnatus, call your office.”

Instead of going home, these so-called ‘formers’ hang around the corridors of power – an army of the political undead, representing vested interests not the public interest.

Of course, ex-politicians are as entitled as anyone else to make a living – especially those quitting politics before retirement age. Some – like our own esteemed editor – go on to higher and better things. But, the American situation, in which getting on for half of all legislators turn into lobbyists, is deeply problematic.  

The British situation is not nearly as bad – not least because most of our MPs have very little influence while in office and even less afterwards. However, the fashion for increasingly youthful ministers means that ex-ministers are getting younger too – something which goes all the way to the top. Take the example of Tony Blair – Prime Minister at 43, ex-Prime Minister at 54.

Perhaps we should be less interested in the lives that politicians had before they got elected and more interested in what they get up to afterwards. 

The new era of low growth will change our politics forever

Previously on the Deep End, we’ve explored the idea that the western world has entered a period of permanent low growth.  The latest GDP figures may allay such fears, but it remains to be seen whether anything like a ‘normal’ rate of growth can be sustained without massive amounts of quantitative easing and public borrowing.

In a fascinating piece for New York magazine, Benjamin Wallace-Wells introduces us to the work of Robert Gordon and other ultra-pessimistic economists:

• “For at least the next fifteen years or so, Gordon argues, our economy will grow at less than half the rate it has averaged since the late-nineteenth century because of a set of structural headwinds that Gordon believes will be even more severe than most other economists do: the aging of the American population; the stagnation in educational achievement; the fiscal tightening to fix our public and private debt; the costs of health care and energy; the pressures of globalization and growing inequality.”

If that were not grim enough, Gordon believes that the previous era in which living standards doubled with every generation is gone forever. The high growth typical of the 20th century was a blip, the product of one-off, never-to-be-repeated transformative events like electrification and the introduction of public sewers.

If he’s right, then the consequences won’t just be economic. That's because rapid growth doesn't only make us richer, it also facilitates and inspires social change. For instance, feminist ideas have been around since the days of Mary Wollstonecraft, but a certain level of material progress was required before traditional gender roles could be permanently transformed:

• “The labors that housework required in the nineteenth century were so consuming that housewives in North Carolina walked 148 miles a year carrying 35 tons of water for nonautomated chores. It took until the fifties for household appliances to decline so much in price that they were ubiquitous; the next decade was the one of women’s liberation.”

Similarly, the idea of racial equality is not an invention of the 20th century, but it wasn’t until the post-war period that the civil rghts movement could draw upon sufficient support from that hotbed of revolutions – the middle class:

• “The prospects for African-American employment increased most dramatically during World War II and in the period just after: 16.4 percent of black men held middle-class jobs in 1950; by 1960 it was 24 percent; by 1970, 35 percent. Progressives will often describe the history of social liberation by quoting Martin Luther King Jr.’s line that the arc of the moral universe bends toward justice; the implication is that metaphysics are somehow involved. But this history has also taken place during unique economic times, and perhaps that is not coincidence.”

Martin Luther King also said “I have a dream”, echoing and expanding the idea of the “American Dream”. But as Wallace-Wells points out, this latter phrase was only coined in 1931 – i.e. once Americans had come to expect continual improvements in their prosperity. 

To foresee an end to rapid growth is not to predict a reversion to a new dark age – but rather an end to the assumption that “things can only get better”.

The end of economic optimism will have a profound impact on our political development. For instance, if voters stop believing that growth will automatically deal with our debts, then that's bad news for the borrow-and-spend politics of the left. But the right will also need to rethink its message – especially on the issue of inequality. If the cake stops getting bigger, then there will be a lot more concern about the size of the slice taken by the rich.

These shifts in opinion are already underway – as shown by the public anger directed at bankers on the one hand and welfare claimants on the other. In other words, when new opportunities are hard to come by, it's not liberty or equality that people care most about, but fairness.

Heresy of the week: David Cameron is not on the left of the Conservative Party

Blairite blogger Hopi Sen has a confession:

• “I sometimes like to introduce myself to Labour party people as ‘the most right-wing person in the Labour party’. I’ve found it’s a very good way to avoid being invited to sit on committees, working groups or panels, which is my main aim in all interactions with Labour party activists and thinkers.
• “I’m not sure if I’m really the most right-wing person in the Labour party (though as Brian Clough said, I’m in the top one). Instead I think I’m in the minority of people on the left who don’t quietly regard being on the right as being evidence of some gaping internal moral chasm.”

This sets him apart from other leftwing writers like Sunny Hundal who thinks we’re “evil” and Owen Jones who merely considers us to be “cruel” and “unforgivable”.

Mr Sen, however, is a grown-up:

• “Do I think the Tories want to see food banks, or increased poverty? No. I think they’re either seen as the unfortunate side effect of essential policies, to be ameliorated where possible, or as an intransigent problem with roots that go very deep and can only really be addressed at the individual, atomic level.”

So what is it that makes him a Labour supporter?

• “I think Social Democracy works – it produces better outcomes, it raises more human capability, it educates, heals and employs and it constantly tries to improve. The social market model is a wonderful, amazing thing, and it’s wonderful and amazing in part because it’s messy, and there is a constant ferment of attempts to try to improve the way things work.
• “Sometimes, of course, it doesn’t work. Sometimes government fails, just as sometimes markets fail… What I love about social democracy though, is that when things go wrong (as they always will), you’re not forced to hew to the same way of delivering your sought outcomes because of an ideological fixedness…” 

That’s an interesting answer because it suggests that there is at least a sliver of intelligent Labour support that could be won over if we could prove that the Conservative Party is the best bet for social innovation in the public interest. And that means being as tough on rent-seeking corporate interests – for instance, among the utility companies – as we are on backward-looking public sector unions.

Hopi Sen’s conclusion is just as interesting:

• “You know who doesn’t laugh when I introduce myself as the most right-wing person in the Labour party?
• “Tories.
• “They look uncomfortable, and a bit confused...”

But perhaps they’re not confused at all. Rather, they may well be preoccupied with the following question: ‘If this chap is the most rightwing person is the Labour Party, then who’s the most leftwing person in the Conservative Party?’ And the answer to that, for a certain kind of rightwinger, is none other than David Cameron himself.

Which is, of course, nonsense. David Cameron is not on the left of the Conservative Party at all. The first ever Conservative leader to promise a referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Union is no ‘wet’. Nor is the head of a government which has already enacted radical reform on welfare, education, immigration, local government and the police.

That doesn’t mean that rightwingers have had it all their own way. Quite clearly, they haven’t – nor should they. The Conservative Party is itself a broad-based coalition – and, so, as well as being polite to our opponents in the Labour Party we should try to be more understanding of one another too. 

Heresy of the week: Labour is still on course to win the next general election

The Deep End has featured articles by Dan Hodges before (here and here) – which are typical of his fearlessly honest style. There are few political writers, especially on the left, so willing to take a subject close to their hearts and then poke around its underbelly with such ferocious abandon.

His favourite topic is the Labour Party, of which he is a longstanding member and activist – but also an unrestrained critic. In particular, it is his brilliant running commentary on the many failings of Ed Miliband that have endeared Hodges to the right, while attracting the fury of the left.

However, one might wonder whether it’s not all an elaborate ruse. Could it be that the self-declared “Blairite cuckoo in Ed Miliband’s nest” is in fact a Brownite sleeper agent out to lull Conservatives into a false sense of security?

The answer to that, of course, is ‘no, you'd better get out of the sun’. But, nevertheless, Hodges is one of the most convincing purveyors of a dangerously reassuring narrative. Consider the following piece from the Telegraph earlier this week:

• "There’s lots of excitement this morning at today’s ICM poll which shows Labour’s lead over the Tories has vanished. In the marathon that is the run-in to the 2015 general election David Cameron is now comfortably poised on Ed Miliband’s shoulder with a good few miles left to run."

There’s an acknowledgement that other polls still show a significant Labour lead, but that’s not the point, he argues:

• “Frankly, it doesn’t matter whether Labour’s lead is nine points, zero points, or somewhere in between (for what it’s worth, I think somewhere in between is probably the most accurate reflection of the respective party’s current standings). Labour’s lead simply isn’t anywhere near big enough.
• “At this stage in 1985 Labour enjoyed a three-point ICM lead. At the general election two years later, that became a Tory lead of 11 points. At the same period two years out from the 1992 election Labour’s lead was 16 points...”

All true as far as it goes, but there’s no reason why past patterns should continue to apply. During the Thatcher era we saw regular cycles of mid-term blues and election-winning highs, but then, following the ERM debacle of 1992, the Conservative Party flatlined at about thirty per cent for more than a decade. Contrast that to Labour’s post-2010 recovery, where, from a lower share of the vote than that gained by John Major in 1997, it took less than two years for the party to move into a sustained lead.

Furthermore, let’s not forget what Labour’s current support is composed of, which is their core 2010 vote plus a fair chunk of left-leaning former Lib Dem voters (which is all Ed Miliband needs to win). We shouldn’t expect these to swing back to the Conservatives as a matter of course because they didn’t swing away from us in the first place.

Ah, but, says Mr Hodges, Conservative support could swing back from a different source – UKIP:

• "Different pollsters have different methodologies for measuring support for Nigel Farage and his merry men, but all the pollsters agree on one thing: that support is declining. And as it does, Tory support it rising.
• “Some people argued that in the wake of the local elections Ukip had made a political breakthrough of such significance and scale they were set to break the mould of British politics. That is now being shown to be rubbish.”

Except that what most polls show is UKIP still polling strongly – and usually outpolling the Lib Dems. To have become the third party of British politics is surely a breakthrough of sorts. Certainly, it provides a base from which opportunities (such as those presented by next year’s European elections) can be seized.

At the very least, the UKIP factor is proof that past patterns of party support are not fated to repeat themselves down through the years.

Dan Hodges has one final card to play:

• “There is one other thing all the polls agree on: Ed Miliband is crap. Or rather, the British people do not think he has what it takes to be Prime Minister, which in politics amounts to the same thing. Perceptions about Miliband are now set in stone. He could deport Len McCluskey, introduce hanging for shoplifters and personally lead an audacious commando raid to overthrow Kim Jong-un. And people would still see him as weak and indecisive.”

A good point, well made. But having a deeply inadequate leader didn't stop the French Socialists from winning. It is precedent that should, despite the current heat, cause us all to shiver.

Heresy of the week: British politics is too clear cut

These days it is fashionable to accuse our fence-sitting, consensus-hugging, compromise-loving politicians of being all the same. 

David Cameron would have a two word answer to that: “Len McCluskey”. George Osborne, meanwhile might reply “Ed Balls”; Michael Gove,“Christine Blowers”; Iain Duncan Smith, “Owen Jones”; Boris Johnson, “Ken Livingstone”; and Theresa May could trump the lot with “Abu Qatada”.

British politics is characterised by real differences on important issues and it is juvenile to pretend otherwise. Indeed, it could be argued that in many ways, our political differences are too clear cut – and that far from sitting on the fence, we’re all too ready to hurl unthinking abuse from one side of it to the other.

Heresy of the week: Conservatism is not about keeping everything the same

“A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling Stop!” These words – from that great conservative intellectual William Buckley – are often quoted in attempts to define conservatism. However, it is not the full quotation, which carries on as follows: “...at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it.”

Note the qualification. Conservatism is not about blanket opposition to change, but about remaining open to the case for continuity – even when others have closed their minds to it. Indeed, given the option, continuity is to be preferred. Or, as various conservatives are quoted as saying: “if it is not necessary to change, it is necessary not to change.” But again note the qualification – change may be necessary.

This is something to bear in mind when reading Peter Oborne’s critique of the Coalition Government in the Telegraph. As we know, Mr Oborne doesn’t like other people having a go at David Cameron and his team, but he reserves the right to do so himself:

• “...it is absurd to criticise Mr Cameron’s government for being too cautious and consensual. If anything this admirably radical administration deserves criticism for doing too much. In its urgent ambition to leave an enduring mark on society, it is arguably in danger of trying to make too many changes at once.”

Oborne is certainly right to say that this a radical government:

• “On welfare, on education, on health and even (up to a certain point) on the economy, Cabinet ministers have embarked on ambitious change. Many of these changes are, furthermore, emphatically Conservative in vision and inspiration.”

The charge that the Government is making “too many changes at once” is less convincing. Britain is still on the path to bankruptcy. It is heading for the cliff edge at a slower rate than before, thanks to the progress made since 2010, but it has yet to stop, let alone turn around.

Oborne, though, is afraid that the Government has been infiltrated by a gang of blue Maoists:

• “There are too many radicals at the heart of the Cameron government – and not enough Conservatives. These radicals fail to share the Conservative insight that continuity matters more than change, and stability more than either.”

Continuity of what exactly? Oborne concentrates on two examples – the civil service and the legal system. It would seem that Francis Maude is intent on politicising the former, while Chris Grayling privatises the latter:

• “In an extraordinary and unprecedented development, 18 out of 20 permanent secretaries have quit their departments since the 2010 general election. This is a scandal.”

Oborne writes as if thirteen years of Labour rule had never happened and had no significant impact on the composition, character and competence of the civil service. After a disastrous decade of monumental administrative failure, can he really not see the need for sweeping change? If the mandarins have not found the transition from profligacy to austerity to their liking, that is their problem – and the decision to quit was theirs too.

The Grayling reforms to the legal system are a separate matter – though once again the driver is the urgent need to save money, not ideology. Oborne claims that “after Mr Grayling has done his work justice will continue to be available, at a stiff price, for the very rich” – rather like the current situation, then.

It's all very well for philosophical conservatives to exclaim “don’t just do something, stand there!” But sometimes the status quo is unsustainable. Or, to look at it another way, sometimes we have to choose what to conserve and what to let go. Right now that choice is between national solvency and the favoured arrangements of a bloated establishment.

Heresy of the week: The ‘Roons’ and ‘Loons’ are both to blame for the problems of the Conservative Party

The ‘Mods’ and ‘Rockers’ of the Conservative Party are now the ‘Roons’ and ‘Loons’ – that is to say, the ‘Cameroons’ of the modernising Tory left and the ‘Swivel-eyed Loons’ of the traditionalist Tory right.

It’s not as simple as that, of course, but as a pared-down description of the party’s on-and-off civil war it has its uses.

Writing for Standpoint, there’s no doubt as to where Robin Harris stands, which is over the grave of the enemy, grimly satisfied:

• “Tory modernisation… is definitively dead. It is no longer a project: it is a curiosity...
• “The party leadership fears losing office and the MPs fear losing their seats. In such conditions, they throw out anything that weighs them down. The gunwales are already low in the water, and modernisation has been pumped out of the bilges.”

By way of evidence for his assessment of the situation Harris cites a variety of tougher, more vocal stances on Europe, immigration, welfare and other issues:

• “...the most unlikely transformation is of Theresa May, who has changed from sea-green moderniser to eye-popping populist… The reinvented May is now threatening to abandon the European Convention on Human Rights, berating pussy-footing officials and chastising the judiciary in a rhetorical war with illegals, terrorists and assorted softies.”

For Robin Harris, the modernisers always were the nastiest part of the Conservative Party:

• “First, they gathered around Michael Portillo. Then after his withdrawal, successively supporting and later destroying William Hague and Iain Duncan Smith, they shrewdly used Michael Howard to promote one of their own, in the pliable form of David Cameron. Politics is a brutal game. But for sustained personal unpleasantness the Conservative modernisers deserve some kind of award. In private and in print, their long campaign was carried on in a tone of consistently venomous contempt.”

Again this is a simplification. Harris’s taxonomy of the different modernising factions barely scratches the surface of what was really going on. For instance, it’s worth mentioning that key modernisers like George Osborne and Danny Finkelstein were loyal lieutenants to William Hague, even as other modernisers did everything in their power to undermine his leadership. 

Nevertheless, Harris is right to remind us of the sheer viciousness of this period. Those responsible for what was done to Hague and IDS have never apologised – and while particular individuals have been able to move on, the party, as a whole, has not.

Harris is also right to trace the origins of the modernising project to “the shattering defeat of 1997.” However, his explanation for that defeat is thoroughly inadequate:

• “The Conservative Party was clearly narrowly-based and unrepresentative. But that was the effect, not the cause of the problem. By the last days of Major, the party no longer represented success, so successful people kept away. And so it looked like a rump — because it was indeed a rump. Rumps are not usually attractive.”

This is a beautifully circular account, but it does not begin to explain the loss of five million votes – an unprecedented electoral catastrophe. The modernisation project may have been the wrong reaction and, at times, a deeply unpleasant reaction, but it was not an over-reaction.

Tory traditionalists have never been able to provide a convincing explanation for our greatest electoral disaster: a failure of imagination that gave the modernisers their big chance – because they, at least, had something to put on the table.

What the modernisers offered was not good enough – a fact that becomes more apparent by the day, but to pretend that all of our problems are their fault is yet another cop-out.