The coming battle over Mainstream Conservatism

normanc

Don't the Lib Dems get a say?

What do you think their members would prefer, a coalition with the Nasty Party (saying pre-election that this is what they would do would drive their voters in their droves to Labour) or the kind, caring, progressive, Labour Party?

To suggest that it's simply up to the Conservative leadership to decide whether or not to offer the poor Lib Dems some crumbs from the table is breathtakingly arrogant.

Rhoda Klapp

Once it becomes clear that you either had no principles. or you are prepared to sell them to get power, it is certain what kind of conservative you are: a non-conservative.

Oh, I should point out that the whole context of this post is in error, for the three main parties in this country are all the same, separable ony by temporary alliances or elastic positions on a set of 'acceptable' issues while not mentioning any of several elephants in the room.

WhiteWednesday

Subtext of Tim's message: "We've rumbled Dave and now need to do something about this imposter who leads us."

About time too.

PayDirt

Yes, maintream conservatives should not be LibDem picking up the Labour baton of have it now, pay later. Somebody has got to get a grip of the English/Welsh/Scottish problem with Cameron’s approach of make the English pay. When we see something manifestly unfair then we get very angry. I would be more concerned if the English students were not rioting. They are leading the way on this. Unfortunately Cameron is trashing the Conservative Party and I for one will no longer vote for his kind of wetness.

RobD

Surely there is a difference between those who want more coalition (the 16%) and those favour a more liberal conservatism. There are those who would like the Conservatives to govern alone but with a broadly liberal conservative mandate. It appears Tim is reading too much into his poll results and thinking 2 plus 2 equals 5.

Dave Leishman

I read the piece in the Times earlier this week. I thought it was nonsense. He failed to provide definitions for both types of conservatism and then he sought to discuss their differences, which is pretty daft.

I would describe the classic liberal conservatism as the true approach to conservatism, especially when considering the roots of the conservative party. The other, what Tim describes as “mainstream”, is an odd religion-propelled paternalism; very little of this approach resonates with my idea of conservatism. That’s not to say it’s wrong, of course.

It would be a hell of a lot easier if we all just listened to Milton Friedman. He classified himself as a liberal, in the true and classic sense of the word. The sooner the word “liberal” is associated with the right and not with the left, and not as a derogatory term then the clearer all this business will be.

SC

When Tim's views become 'mainstream Conservatism' we roar on sidelines, to no avail.
Again.
Been there and done that Tim.
And we'd still be there if you have your way.
Tim is the self appointed voice of the Tory party. He's popular in his own head.

It's all a bit 'David Davis' for me.

Chris

There is no correlation between "liberal conservatism" and the continuance of the coalition. Coalitions are not good for long term stability, and lead to farces such as the tution fee affair where the Secretary of State responsible wasn't even really in favour of it.

So the whole article is built on a flawed premise, that only 16% are liberal conservatives.

Rubrikcon

There's a simpler version. If the Conservatives win an overall majority they will govern alone and outright. If they fail to do this they will attempt to form another coalition.

I'm a liberal conservative and pleased with the moderating effect the coalition is having on the party, but even I cannot see an argument for continuing with a coalition when the party has the option to govern outright. I'd be surprise if that idea has any credence in any quarter.

lids

I just want David Davis to break away from Cameron's Conservative Party and start a new one, a proper one....

Vulture

It's untrue that public opinion is composed of soggy pink-green Cam/Clegg liberalism. Metropolitian Guardian/BBC opinion perhaps, but not outside the 'village' in the harsh real world.

As Reagan and Thatcher proved, its a question of leadership. Offer a programme combining IDS-style compassionate Conservatiism giving help to the genunely poor, and tough Toryism which would reclaim the country from the hands of the EU/Islam/
criminals and you would see the votes roll in.

The Tory party, befittting its tradition as the 'stupid party' has allowed itself to be captured by an unrepresentative liberal clique which could not win an election against the worst Govt and maddest PM in British history.

Reclaiming the party from Dave for Mainstream Conservatism could be the first step towards reclaiming the country.

SC

lol. Tim 'self apppinted voice of Conservatives' even states in his article:

'The vast majority of party members, in contrast, are frustrated with the leadership’s unwillingness to argue for traditional Conservative positions.'

Evidence please?

Has he seen Cameron's approval rating amongst Conservative voters? They are incredibly high. 96%ish.

On what basis does he think he has the right to speak for me. A Tory member or the voters who give Cameron historically unheard of personal approvals ratings?

The fact is his site attracts a certain sort and repels others. Tim spends a great deal of time effectively to himself.

an ex-tory voter

these voters could be left floating and disaffected.

What planet is this man on? These tory voters are already disaffected. This particular one will remain "an ex-tory voter" whilst Cameron and his tribe remain in control.

Don

It was all going so well until you mentioned a conhome poll. Conhome is really the home of UKIP frothers.

Adro

Is it possible to be a liberal Conservative and still be with the 'mainstream'. I would call myself relatively (please note the small 'l') liberal, yet have no great belief in the continuation of the coalition unless we fail to get a majority.

Noa

"79 percent of Tory members want their party to govern on its own after 2015, and only 16 percent would prefer coalition with the Lib Dems.."

What do the remaining 5% think?
That expenses should be liberalised?

Clearly the Party back benchers still, just, want to retain Conservative values. Though we shouild expect that the 16% are those actually running the Party and will have purged all that sort of nonsense by the next election.

2trueblue

Who knows? One thing is clear, Cameron will not strengthen his, and the Conservatives line He ignored the EU issue last time round and that is what cost him his majority.

I hate the line 'we are all in this together'. No, we are not. The MPs are still looking after themselves.....last Thursday afternoon the house of commons was full. Why? because they were sorting out the 'expenses' again. No, seriously, our MPs have to get a grip. What the heck do they think the rest of us are doing? We certainly do not have an 'off-line' set of expenses that does not goo to HMRC, and neither should they.

The electorate will judge them, rightly or wrongly, on how much we have to suffer. right now it is a wait and see time. Those of us who have always paid our way will in the end get fed up if we see that we are paying again and again, whilst others take, again and again. The public purse is just that, ours, and we have inflation that bears no resemblance to the official figures. It is pretty meaningless. Ofcom is a waste of space, fuel went up 45% 2yrs ago and was never addressed by them. Why do we need these people when the office of fair trading could incorporate this area?

TomTom

The LibDems are finished as a party and will split just as Liberals did after 1931. The Conservatives will be even further away from a majority than in 2010 and only Labour will be able to capture anything approaching a majority, though that too is debatable.

Clegg and Cameron are so similar in family background and links to Conservayive grandees that they created this administration....it will not be possible to replicate it because only Clegg and Cameron have the common City links....and this administration was created by The City for The City

Victor Southern

2TrueBlue

Ofcom has no control over fuel prices - their remit is communications. I believe that generally the prices of all aspects of communications have reduced year-by-year.

The prices of fuel and energy are indeed cause for concern but after 13 years of a time-wasting government the number of unresolved problems is enormous. It is very unlikely that they can all be sorted out in one term, yet alone in 7 months in office.

The high-pitched continuous drone of Kippers will not assist in any way except as expression of personal peevishness. I am all for reducing the grip of the EU on the UK but it is about 9th on my list of priorities so I might concentrate on it in about 6 years time.

Norman Dee

The entire problem next election is going to be what do you believe when they say anything. Although their euroscepticism was under question at the last election the conservatives still managed to get enough support to be where they are. What will be the story next time?, they cannot really be less eurosceptic, and who is going to believe them if they are more ? Their overall performance since the election is not as good as most wamted and expected, and if nothing is forthcoming on Europe during this parliament, and other areas don't gain strengh there is no way on Earth they are going to get near a majority next time. The vote will be split up amongst a bunch of smaller parties, and the BBC will be back in government, is Cameron not aware of these possibilities?, because he only needs a slight downturn in the economy and it will be the Conservatives that will be history not the socialists.

finchy

To be more mainstream the Conservatives are going to have to appeal more than just their core constiuency of old people and those with assets.

So far they're not doing a good job. They've ring-fenced winter fuel payments and the NHS, proposed to reduce inheritance tax and stopped new house building.

I blame Labour for screwing up the economy and applaud public spending cuts, but I'm not sure I can bring myself to vote for a party that's not promoting social mobility.

Social mobility will be improved by shifting the tax burden from income to assets, spreading the cuts more evenly across departments and increasing the supply of affordable housing.

(I have of course not mentioned education. That deserves a whole post to itself)

2trueblue

Victor Southern, sorry meant Offgem! communications has gone down primarily because of competition.

The price of fuel is very fundamental to most aspects of our daily lives. There is not one moment of our daily round that is unaffected by same, so it is very dear to my heart and pocket that someone gets a grip on it. There is very little that it does not affect, including the air we breathe, or at least the quality of it.

EU 9th on your list. Good for you. Again I think you are on another planet. Our very freedoms are now governed by the EU, we import or have sold off our utilities to other menber states so, the EU situation is of the utmost importance.

Whilst you say nothing about where or what is important, what do you have to offer?

In2minds

@lids - Yes that's the answer, a new Tory party, or at least it splits into to sections. The Lib Dems are well on their way to this which would solve their problem too. As for Labour holding together and coming out on top all I say is do you know any Labour voters? The ones I meet have lived with the Brown/Blair split for years and will do nothing to stop it becoming official.

lids

I am constantly surprised that the harder right vote is not being chased by any viable party. UKIP are a joke but there are literally millions of hard working people out there despairing of the continuous battle for the centre ground.

If one looks to europe, the right wing groups are in the ascendancy. David Davis is the man to do it. I hope he goes for it before the next general election. I am utterly fed up with Cameron and his pathetic alliance of bleeding hearts.

TGF UKIP

There is no large party of the Right in the UK just as there is no weekly magazine of the Right.

If there were such a publication, the question it would be addressing is what UKIP needs to do develop a wider conservative identity rather than being identified as almost solely a Eurosceptic one. In short how can UKIP comprehensively loot the Cameron Tory Party so that it can get not only a parliamentary foothold but deprive the Cameron progressives of upwards of 100 seats next time round.

yank

It's not "the coming battle". It's always been. We've been having it here since 2005 or so. Conservatives here washed their hands of it all in 2006 and 2008, knowing what would be the outcome, but with full understanding that only by withdrawing support for the anti-liberal and anti-conservative elements controlling our coalition could we bring about the fundamental change required here.

We're now on the brink of seeing whether we can bring on those necessary changes. But not even that brink would have been approachable, if we hadn't toughed it out, and allowed the deadwood to fall. We killed some of it ourselves of course, here in 2010.

Cameron's Tories are in the exact same position now as we were 5 years ago, and that's why he was unable to win the election. You all get it already, apparently. And if your LD's ever become liberal, I'd be all for a coalition with them, but I don't see them as that. They are but an echo.

Now, do you all have the fortitude to allow your deadwood to fall, and accept the short term consequences of that action? That's the question.

Your path is tougher than ours, as we have the ability to unsheath the blade in open primaries. But in the main, the battle is the same, as it is one of incumbents of all parties working to protect their incumbencies. You have to take out, or allow to be taken out, those incumbents, even if it means the Left replaces them (temporarily). A terribly inefficient process, but it's the only one we have, isn't it?

And that means votes must be cast on principle, not with some bogus "strategic" impetus, wherein we can't afford to allow the other guy to win a seat, so we accept the unacceptable. Hell, he's already won it on principle then... in many cases. That's the whole point.

UKIP's fraction is going to grow. The LD's will fall. Simples. Anybody doubt that a snap election today would reflect that? A conservative would understand this, and work within that reality.

And for God's sake would you all PLEASE quell your jerked knees over this "nasty party" business? It's shameful the way you go on. The people who respond to that are gone from you probably forever, and you need not waste a moment worrying over them. There's business to attend to here, and it's pointless swinging at pitches in the dirt. We play the long game, one even longer than the long march. Jerked knees have no place.

paulg

This is all speculative nonsense, parties are coalitions themselves, the conservative party is the party of the nation, its history and culture; manifesting itself as as a political machine.

Difference is society are accommodated and, as a reflection of that society conservatism can and will accommodate differences so long as the authority of the crown, the sovereignty of parliament and the liberty of the people, are the central themes of conservative thinking.

In2minds

@TGF UKIP "how can UKIP comprehensively loot the Cameron Tory Party"?

Dump Farage and his corrupt cronies, it's the only way.

2trueblue

Yank, some very good points. The Tories will survive because there is no alternative, so disagree that their position is unchanged. The split will come from how people see their reality in real terms, can they survive what is to come and is it reasonable what they have to sacrifice to clean up our society. the 'nasty party' expression was cloned by the dim T May and am surprised she is so highly thought of in the party as she is only matched by her shoe change.
We are on the cusp and for a lot of people the change will be too much. We will get less for more in the old terms of spin and bling, but the prize will be a more cohesive society built on reality. People will turn to real values. That is our salvation and it does not lie with Liebore or liberals of any sort.
Cameron has difficulty in getting his message across and not sure why. D Davis is way out on a limb and too self interested so not the man to go forward. UKIP are not a reality and should only be used in the European elections. Sadly they do not live up to scrutiny even there and fail to fight our corner.
Cameron has to be bold and clear. He appears to sit on the fence sometimes and therein does the damage.

TomTom

"Cameron has difficulty in getting his message across and not sure why."

He is a complete joke in Northern England...the Conservatives are a Home Counties fringe party with even less traction in the North than in may 2010.

Stop deluding yourself. Conservatives under Cameron are a Home Counties City-funded party with no relevance north of The Wash

James

"according to a ConservativeHome poll, 79 percent of Tory members want their party to govern on its own after 2015, and only 16 percent would prefer coalition with the Lib Dems"

Surely that's an outcome you'd expect from a poll of 'yes men', isn't it?

I'd describe myself as a liberal conservative (traditional liberal, not the American definition and definitely not a 'Red Tory') and never bother with Tim's site because, in general, it doesn't have anything interesting to say to liberal conservatives like me. It's stuck in the 1970s.

A pensioner

"Social mobility will be improved by shifting the tax burden from income to assets" Not in my case, finchy, unless you mean downward social mobility. I'm asset rich but income poor, having worked all my life (and paid taxes) to buy a decent house and put aside some savings. I'm now retired and live on my pension and savings. Social mobility (upwards) will only be improved by reforming and upgrading the state education system rather than overtaxing those who have been hard-working and prudent.

Ex-Tory voter

"And if the separation between the two parties closes, as compromise follows compromise, then these voters could be left floating and disaffected." What do you mean, "will be"? They already are, as my namesake with the indefinite article has pointed out. I had always voted Tory until Cameron arrived at the head of affairs and transformed their policies into something I could no longer support.

El Sid

It seems that Montgomerie is looking for a Tory equivalent of Gordon Brown, or perhaps a blue Ed Balls, to lead a governing party away from the centre and into the "mainstream" of some self-selecting activists. Or electoral oblivion as it's better known.

As has been pointed out, his stats are utterly bogus. I guess you could count me as one who would prefer the stability of a one-party government, but who rather likes the effect the LibDems have had on moderating the nuttier bits of the blues. Just a shame that it fell to the LD's to provide the coalition's most Thatcherite policy in the £10k income tax allowance - and of course in Laws they provided the most economically sound member of the Cabinet, shame he was hounded out. Goes to show how redundant the old left-right labels are.

Particularly when you get crypto-socialists like 2trueblue turning up, wanting the nanny state to micromanage prices (but then I guess you need a big state to organise hangings and floggings too?). Yes the state has a role in energy policy, but only at the long-term strategic level.

Today's gas prices are a result of Cecil Parkinson and John Wakeham encouraging the dash for gas, which means our indigenous gas was frittered away in electricity generation.OK, you can also partly blame Brown's tax treatment of exploration expenditure and the planning system to some extent, but the dash for gas is the biggy. Now our gas is running out, and so the clearing price for our gas at this time of year is set by the world price for LNG imports - far from the influence of Ofgem. The number of people in the world wanting resources such as gas is increasing at a much greater rate than our ability to increase production, so the price is going up - all pretty standard Malthus/Club of Rome stuff. This is what the Limits to Growth feels like....

Fergus Pickering

finchy, what is social mobility, and why should I want it? Fifty years ago you could argue that the working class was full of intelligent people kept down by the system. But surely the working class is now the repository of the stupid, the idle and the sexually incontinent. The rest have migrated into the sainted middle class. Being governed by Cameron, Osborne and Boris is OK by me. And is not Boris an example of social mobility since his delightful Dad is no-one in particular.

2trueblue

El sid. Going back to C Parkingson, gosh you are in a time warp! The lack of strategy for our energy was totally compounded by Liebore who did nothing but allow their friends in windfarming to get a grip on our future fuel policy....our of 18 on the committee 11 of their buddies were in wind farming which will be proved to contribute very little for our needs in the UK.

Liebore had 13 yrs and could have encouraged more solar panels, and other alternatives. Not expecting a nanny state, that is firmly Liebores area, but do expect a government who had a massive majority to have setup some strategy for fuel planning when even the village idiot could see it was a problem. Signing us up to impossible carbon

Tomtom
Brown was a total joke in the UK never mind the south and did untold with his friend Bliar. They ran the most corrupt parliament in history and the residue is still felt in Westminster. The House of Commons was full on Thursday.. MPs were busy sorting out THEIR problems with their expenses. That is Lisbores legacy. More time has been spent by our MPs sorting out their business than in running other main aspects of our country. They also spent money enslaving those in need of real help to go forward and lead better independent lives.

Boudicca

Vulture
December 10th, 2010 12:42 - Well said

I want a Conservative Party which addresses the fact that English voters and taxpayers are discriminated against under the current devolution settlement. The West Lothian Question must be answered and MPs from devolved regions prevented from voting on English laws. The financial settlement for the celtic regions must be changed so that they are not awarded public money disproportionately. The situation where students in Scotland will pay no fees and Wales will be subsidising students; EU students studying here will be subsidised but English students must pay the full amount is simply unacceptable.

I also want a Conservative Party which accepts that the British people have the right to decide whether we remain a member of the EU. If the Party Leadership/Government wants to campaign for us to remain inside that's fine - but a fair Referendum should be held and the peoples' decision should stand. At the moment we are effectively in a pretend-Democratic Dictatorship - both in Westminster and Brussels.

Our undemocratic membership of the EU is affecting virtually every area of public life in this country. At the moment we pay £45 million a day into the corrupt bureaucracy. When I hear the Government say that 'the country can't afford this, the country can't afford that' I know they are lying. We can afford it - but not whilst we remain in the EU. They would rather send billions to the EU each year, to be wasted on job-destroying bureaucracy; gets allocated to fraudulent claimants or is used to prop up the Euro-currency-folly than spend it in our own country building up our own infrastructure and supporting our own citizens and businesses.

If Cameron won't address these two issues, he won't be getting my vote.

Fergus Pickering

What happens north of the Wash, Tom Tom? Is it very savage there and do you get Sky television? You can have home rule if you want, you know. Just stop taking my money, there's a good little man.

El Sid

@2trueblue - it's not a timewarp, just a reflection of the timescales involved in energy policy - we would not be dependent on gas imports today if trillions of cubic feet of gas had not been urinated away in the dash for gas. And it was the Tories who eliminated the Dept of Energy, which presumably would be your preferred arm of big government for dealing with all this.

Nice bait and switch by the way, I'm not sure what windfarms have to do with the price of domestic gas.

Since you bring it up - what is your basis for your claim that windfarming will contribute very little in the UK? Are you a power engineer? Or is this as well-founded as your claim that Ofcom regulate the energy market? The National Grid appear to disagree with you - they reckon the existing grid can accommodate 20% renewables with no problem, and are planning for 40-50%.

As for cost - NFFO-5 saw 340MW of wind power bid at an average of 2.88p/kWh. That compares with a current price for gas electricity of 3.5-4.0p/kWh (and of course you should be using an average of the gas price over the lifetime of the power station, what will the gas price be in 2035 or 2040?). OK, now the best sites have already been used, onshore wind now comes in at about 6-7p/kWh, but that's comparable with our only modern nuclear power plant, Sizewell B.

On the other hand, your favoured option of solar panels costs 20-30p/kWh (the example on the CAT website has cash costs of 29p/kWh for example). The current feed-in tariffs are just a disaster in so many ways, not least as an industrial policy, but that's another argument.

So 2trueblue, your plan for reducing gas bills appears to involve generating electricity at 29p and denigrating electricity production at 6p. The sheer genius of your plan leaves me speechless.

Rhoda Klapp

I went to the North recently. I found no lack of Mercedes dealers. Apart from the occasional massively publicly-funded infrastructure items, it was much the same as the South. Of course, as most southerners find no reason to get up there, northern politicians carry on as if it was some worth of deprived ex-colony, dependent totally on whatever they can screw out of the evil westminster racket. I just wonder where all those trucks on the M1 are going, if it is such an economic disaster up there.