Dave has some special new Labour friends

10 June 2009

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Anne McElvoy spots a new political type: the ‘Labrators’ who have more in common with Cameron than Brown, and may co-operate with a Tory government

The Labrators are coming: cross-bred symbols of shifting political times. Labour by background and allegiance, they empathise with many of the New Conservatives’ aims and obsessions. As for the political divide, they don’t so much straddle it, as just ignore it.

The only question is how far they’ll go, now that the party that dominated the landscape is a shrunken spectre of its former self. ‘The thing to watch,’ says one of the resigners from Cabinet last week, ‘is who will get involved with Project Cameron and who won’t cross that line.’

Commons floor-crossers have always been with us, treated with some distrust by both their parental and adoptive parties. But as the boundaries between the main parties’ ideologies narrow, fear of contamination by collusion is far less oppressive than it was.

Matthew Taylor, Tony Blair’s former policy chief who now runs the Royal Society of Arts, is a leading Labrator. ‘Speaking as a private individual, I support my party, like I support my football team,’ he says. ‘But I also care about good government. If you kind of know your party is going to lose, and someone else asks you to contribute ideas, I can’t see why not.’ These days, there are a lot more Labrators than Torylabs around, although there was a glut of the latter when Blair was at his height. Shades of that linger in the shadow schools secretary Michael Gove and Cameron’s senior strategist Steve Hilton, who are far more gushing about the Blair than many in his own ranks.

Already, the Conservatives have consulted Michael Barber, head of Mr Blair’s much-mocked ‘delivery unit’, and they admire Julian Le Grand, the Labour public service reform guru. I gather they’ve also spoken at length with serving civil servants about how to improve the daily business of government.

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wonderfulforhisage

June 11th, 2009 12:17pm Report this comment

I despair, Brown goes and we get NuLab Lite headed by the Heir to Blair.

It's enough to make a mother eat her young or vote BNP or something.

Rhoda Klapp

June 11th, 2009 12:42pm Report this comment

Hooray, when one party loses credibility these people will just support the other, so that the Utopia of centre-left politics may continue, unimpaired by any consideration of right or principle.

Scum.

Minnie Ovens

June 11th, 2009 8:18pm Report this comment

I suppose it is quite natural for Mr Cameron to look to his immediate left for friends.
I'm sure they approve of his manifesto far more than the right wing Conservatives do.
Well, that's if anyone knew what his policies were, but I guess he's probably told his new friends what they are.
Doesn't seem if Dave is picking up many of the disgruntled voters from Labour.
I wonder why not?

c chapman

June 12th, 2009 12:36pm Report this comment

Frank Field would certainly be a good man to talk to. The inside track on what stopped his welfare reforms and his ideas on controlling the massive welfare budget would be valuable in the extreme. I can never understand why he hasn't crossed the floor. He is far too sensible to still be in the same party as Brown and Prescott.

The Masked Marvel

June 13th, 2009 6:56pm Report this comment

This sounds like some Bizarro version of Reagan Democrats. That worked for at least one election, and one assumes that's all that matters at the moment. Too bad that most voters who aren't already voting Tory use the following formula to understand Mr. Cameron and his party:

Conservative = Toff + "I remember what the BBC remind us it was like under Thatcher".

Crude, but effective. Additionally, Reagan spent far more time on policy, his convictions, and the direction he wished to take the country when elected than on whining about Jimmy Carter's personality and leadership crisis. Perhaps a lesson there for PMQs?

If one is to judge from the recent EU election, it might be a better idea to bring voters over with real policies which will lead the country from strength to strength, instead of trying to triangulate towards them with advice from Labourites. In case anybody forgot, it's those Labourite policies which are the reason Messrs. Griffin and Bron will now have more say in laws which influence British lives than if they were in Westminster.

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