"In Brighton, they praised Tony Blair. Even Gordon Brown managed a bit of it, albeit only in the hope that if he slapped the back of the Prime Minister hard enough, it might shove him out of the door. But quite a lot of those at the Labour conference, especially the Chancellor, couldn't wait to bury the man who has led them to three successive election victories."
So writes Andrew Rawnsley in today's Observer. We all know that the Labour Party has never really warmed to Tony Blair. His tough rhetoric on crime and his opposition to taxing the rich were forgiven because he was a vote winner. The consequences of his alliance with 'that neocon in the White House' have been too much for Labour's rank-and-file to ever forgive.
But as Labour seeks to bury Blairism, Mr Rawnsley sees signs that Tories are embracing aspects of it.
Tony Blair had New Labour; David Davis has Modern Conservatives, for example. Rawnsley: "David Davis declares that his party should not 'ape new Labour' and then does exactly that. Where Blair was a kleptomaniac of Tory language, Davis is engaged in grand larceny of the Blairite verbal wardrobe. At his leadership campaign launch, he talked of 'opportunity for the many, not just the privileged few'. Several other phrases were also copy-and-pastes from the collected speeches of Tony Blair."
David Cameron - who has already been likened (uncharitably) to Tony Blair by Nick Cohen - is also imitating the man Tories have struggled to comprehend for more than a decade: "David Cameron likewise downloads from the master when he tells the Tories: 'We can only change our country if we dare to change our party'. His emphasis on winning back the trust of the public by demonstrating the capacity to change is Blair circa 1994, as is the vagueness about what precisely that change will amount to."
More important than these imitations of style and language, however, are acceptances of Labour policies. Rawnsley notes how New Labour's architects understood that their party "would only be regarded as the appropriate successor to Thatcherism once it had accepted those elements of her settlement that were popular". Inspired by Peter Riddell, this blog has previously examined this issue of Labour's '1997 Settlement'. The Tories are already on the road to that acceptance. The minimum wage, Bank of England independence and the increased scale of health and education spending have already all been accepted. Rawnsley notes how today's leadership contenders are now prepared to go further with David Cameron, for example, speaking "admiringly of the creation of foundation hospitals and city academies".
David Cameron is closer to being Blair's successor than David Davis. His public service reform agenda lacks the radicalism of David Davis' emphasis on sweeping change. Mr Cameron appears to have accepted that the public won't support radical reforms. Mr Davis thinks that the nation's schools and hospitals need nothing less. They both could be right.
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