Editorial: Is everyone a Portillista now? No.

Francis Maude will tell today's conference that the Conservative Party must "change or die".  But Mr Maude arrives in Blackpool with his stock very low.  Post-election periods are not happy times for Francis Maude. He was responsible for directing Michael Portillo’s unsuccessful 2001 leadership bid and has just overseen the defeat of Michael Howard’s post-election reforms to party procedure. He appears to be seeking consolation in the idea that he was right in 2001 and that we are all Portillistas now:

Ollie Stone-Lee, reporting for BBCi: “Does [Francis Maude] think the battle for the agenda pursued by Mr Portillo’s [2001] campaign has been won?”

Francis Maude:”I think broadly yes.”

I think broadly ‘no’. Superficially there appears to have been a lot of acceptance of Michael Portillo’s leadership manifesto but on many substantial questions there remains enormous disagreement. Take four key features of Mr Portillo’s thinking, starting with the one where consensus might be thought to be greatest:

Candidate diversity: Nearly all accept the Portillo belief in a candidate selection policy that seeks more people who can ably represent today’s Britain. Whereas MP stressed more blacks, gays and women, today’s leadership contenders are prioritising people from local communities and candidates who have worked in the public services or the voluntary sector. Portillo’s face-deep diversity can only deliver a limited kind of progress if we end up with black barristers, female merchant bankers and gay men who have never worked outside of the Westminster village.

Social liberalism: The party leadership has moved in a socially liberal direction with support, for example, for gay partnerships but the approach has two main weaknesses. Few voters think it matters. When the Centre for Social Justice/ YouGov asked voters who were society’s most vulnerable members gay people hardly registered. Pensioners, children, people with mental illnesses and those living in crime-ridden inner cities were peoples’ top concerns. The other main weakness is that there can be big tensions between a genuinely compassionate conservatism and a socially liberal conservatism. The Portillistas’ support for drug liberalisation and indifference to the importance of the family are only like to abet socially destructive forces. The fact that all of the leading candidates (except Ken Clarke) are advocating support for marriage and all (except David Cameron) are intolerant of drug use suggests that the party is not so Portillista.

War on terror: Michael Portillo began as a supporter of the war in Iraq but, for last November’s US elections, he ended up advocating a vote for the flip-flopping John ‘Wrong War At The Wrong Time In The Wrong Place’ Kerry. It is now difficult to find any coherent anti-terror strategy in his meandering columns on the subject. The lack of coherence may be the one area where the Conservative Party, as a whole, may, indeed, have become Portillista.

Party discipline: And, finally, let’s hope few Conservatives are adopting the Portillista-approach to “loyalty”. He briefed against John Major throughout the Maastricht years whilst serving as one of his ministers. He battled against William Hague’s strategy when he was Mr Hague’s Shadow Chancellor. He launched broadside attacks on Iain Duncan Smith’s leadership. He used his Sunday Times column to regularly criticise Michael Howard. Many of those criticisms were justified but they were less than helpful in the run-up to an election. And where MP himself was unhelpful his ‘Portillista’ disciples were regularly very corrosive with their constant briefings to journalists.

Comments

[Sean Fear]

I tend to agree. It's an issue that about one quarter of one percent of the population care strongly about. Yet, to listen to some people, one could easily imagine the public as a whole talked of little else.

I agree that one should do the right thing, regardless of how interested the public are in a subject. I think it's right that this issue should be left to a free vote. But there's room in our party for people who either approve or disapprove of homosexuality, as there is for those who take differing sides on issues like abortion and hunting.

[Rob]

"But there's room in our party for people who either approve or disapprove of homosexuality, as there is for those who take differing sides on issues like abortion and hunting."

I guess this was designed to be provocative somehow, and should probably be ignored, but I do wish there wasn't room in our party for people who compare being gay to some kind of hobby, like hunting.

Of course we're not going to storm to victory because of some gay rights agenda, but surely we need to be rid of attitudes like this. As Theresa May said today:

"Don't think you'll find a refuge from the modern world here.

There is no place for you in our Conservative Party."

[Bruce]

"I do wish there wasn't room in our party for people who compare being gay to some kind of hobby... surely we need to be rid of attitudes like this". Does the Labour Party make a practice of throwing out its many voters who don't share Rob's views on what "attitudes" are appropriate? Can any party seeking to regain power succeed by reading many of its core supporters not only out of the party but also out of the public discourse?

[NickB]

A more pertinent question would be: can any party seeking to regain power afford to tolerate the sort of casual bigotry exhibited by comments such as the one equating homosexuality with foxhunting? Thankfully we have the likes of May and Duncan who understand this issue to offset the hopefully diminishing band who think they have a God-given right to approve or disapprove of another person's sexuality. Of course there are homophobes, racists and all sorts of other undesirables in all parties - and always will be - but that doesn't mean we should refrain from highlighing the unacceptability of such views in a party that purports to represent all sections of society.

[Adrian Sherman]

There appears to be a gap in the market for a candidate who appeals to heterosexual, white, law abiding, patriotic, socially conservative, tax cutting, family and marriage orientated voter.

Still the majority...
....outside the scummy London metropolitan elite, which Cameron embodies.

Liam Fox appears to tick most of the boxes.

[Daniel Vince-Archer]

"Daniel, unless I missed something obvious, Alan was just describing his own opinion about how he thinks gay issues come across on this forum, and apart from the quote of yours in section 3 of his post, the points he made weren't even explicitly aimed at you. So I don't get why you needed to rebut him as if he was attacking you, and accuse him of misrepresenting you." - Rob

Alan admits he was arguing with me in the post immediately after yours Rob. Try again.

"Daniel, no offence was intended- far from it. I was arguing with you, yes, but that is the point of debate." - Alan

I don't have a problem with you arguing with me Alan, as long as you don't misrepresent my view to do so.

"My intial comment was not directed at you but instead was referring to the house opinion of conservativehome.com. If my posts are slightly erractic in organisation and ambigious in content it's because I've had 3 hours sleep." - Alan

Yes sorry I was just being oversensitive. Point conceded.

"My position is that gay rights issues are less pressing than some issues and more pressing than others. I don't think the Tory party should quibble over same sex reltionships I think it should be decisive. The gay rights agenda can be addressed in an understated, unfussy fashion without having to detract from more heart grabbing issues for the population at large." - Alan

I'm glad we seemingly agree on this.

"It's the fact that you refer to gay folk seeking redress for genuine grievences to be 'pandering' that I do find objectionable. I see it as no more pandering than for OAPs to campaign on issues of financial hardship which affect their lives." - Alan

My point was that the gay rights lobby has been pandered to by allowing its issues to dominate the agenda to establish a more socially liberal agenda at the expense of more important issues. And I'm sorry but campaigning for gay weddings and the right to have sex in toilets is not comparable to campaigning against OAPs freezing to death because they can't afford heating or seeing out their lives in poor health and misery because they can't afford private care.

"I do object to this comment, which I falsely attributed to someone else, sorry (Midnight Blue). Why is it bending over backwards to help gay people and not to help women or the elderly, is my point? Can we not extend our attention to the plight of many individuals & groups?" - Alan

You've missed my point which was that we've been/we risk being so busy tying ourselves in knots over the gay rights issue that we've been/we risk being unable to extend our attention to the plight of groups which require attention most urgently.

"I was referring to all gay rights issues which involve the state explicitly prohibiting homosexuals from doing things like getting married. That no longer refers to adoption which has already been decided on.I do think it should be a priority for a Tory government to elevate homosexuals from a status in law, which is less than equal, to one which is nothing but." - Alan

Thank you for clarifying that. I was a bit confused what you were referring to before!

[Bruce]

NickB, I don't think the comments you mention equated homosexuality to fox-hunting, as you charge. But more importantly, your calling such comments "casual bigotry" is the type of name calling that should have no place in our discussions. Perhaps if you stopped calling people who don't share your views "homophobes" and stopped comparing them to "racists and other undesirables", you might get more people to agree with you. Just imagine how you'd react if you were called a "bigot", a "heterophobe", an "undesirable" or a "racist".

[Midnight Blue]

Ooh wasps nest well and truly disturbed! I've never had my name mentioned so much! Marvellous! lol

I think the point here is that discrimination against any minority group is bad, gay people (like me) are still occasionally the victims of attacks and abuse, to change this and make homophobia as unacceptable as racism or religious hatred, requires equality in the law and snide remarks from the media and certain politicians (*cough* Edward Leigh *cough*) to stop

There is no need to spend oceans of time on this, or tie ourselves in knots over it, accept that viewing gay people as beneath or different to everybody else (I wont use "homophobia" as it seems to upset some people, and I'm sure you're not that malicious") is wrong no matter what the motivation behind it. Accept it, move on, job done.

[Michael McGowan]

As someone who supports most of what the gay lobby wants, they often seem to me to be their own worst enemy. Attitudes to homosexuality vary widely throughout society and throughout political parties and always well, even though most people are baiscally relaxed about homosexuality. Yet to listen to the modernisers, the Conservative Party must be purged in some quasi-Maoist fashion of all those who harbour thoughts on the subject which deviate from the narrow orthodoxy laid down in the salons of Notting Hill. This is not the behaviour of a modern centre-right political party seeking to attract support from people from all walks of life and backgrounds. It is the authoritarian paranoia of Pol Pot.

[Sean Fear]

I suspect that I've been deliberately misinterpreted.

People have differing opinions over whether homosexual sex is right or wrong; as they do over abortion; as they do over fox hunting; as they do over sex outside marriage; as they do over stem cell research, euthanasia or dozens of other ethical issues.

That is true throughout society and it's true throughout the Conservative Party. Requiring all our members to adopt a party line on an issue of this type is just about the silliest thing I can think of.

[Sean Fear]

And the final point about all of these issues is that they are all ones on which *small* numbers of people have passionate opinions.

That doesn't mean that no politician should address them, but we should all keep a sense of proportion.