Cameron Must Show a Ruthless Streak

Sunday, 7th March 2010

There is an excellent piece on the Ashcroft affair from Martin Ivens in the Sunday Times today. He quotes a member of Team Cameron: "Why didn't David just take Ashcroft out and shoot him? His work is done. What's the point of him hanging about?" Well said.
No one has quite got to the bottom of why the Tory lead has shrunk. But one reason might be the sense that David Cameron is not quite as decisive as he ideally should be.
He lost his nerve over George Osborne when he became an embarrassment in Corfu and he seems to have lost it again over Ashcroft.
Cameron has modelled his rise on Tony Blair but has never shown Blair's brutal approach to his own party. This is why the base of the party remains unreformed. His A-list had to be seriously watered down after he found local parties unreceptive to black, Asian and woman candidates. Baroness Warsi was eloquent on this subject before she was found a place in the House of Lords and hence the Tory front bench.
It will be interesting to see whether David Cameron's first act of serious ruthlessness will coincide with a recovery in the polls.

Filed under: Baroness Warsi (8 more articles) , David Cameron (1718 more articles) , George Osborne (686 more articles) , House of Lords (54 more articles) , Lord Ashcroft (39 more articles) , Tony Blair (228 more articles)

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Rhoda Klapp

March 7th, 2010 9:44am Report this comment

A stick has two ends. How come you always get the wrong one?

Noa Zrk

March 7th, 2010 10:50am Report this comment

Rhoda - unsurpassable

Martin Bright

March 7th, 2010 12:15pm Report this comment

I know I can always rely on you, Rhoda, to remind me that I am a sorry case of liberal softiedom however many times I am called a neo-con Zionist apologist for American imperialism elsewhere.

Noa Zrk

March 7th, 2010 4:38pm Report this comment

Martin - unsurpassable humility

Sir Graphus

March 7th, 2010 8:46pm Report this comment

The indecisiveness is part of a picture that fails to let the electorate know where we're headed.

Incumbency, however bad, has a sort of security of its own. The worse the situation looks, the more people will want security.

You could argue that in this case, the unknown should be less scary than the known; a PM who really doesn't know what he's doing, and who is temperamentally disastrous at his job, coward, bully, liar and all the rest. However, the public has yet to see it in these terms.

Rhoda Klapp

March 8th, 2010 9:02am Report this comment

Martin, off the actual topic, but there is a germ of truth in your observation. It seems to me that we raving right-wing loons regard the left as mostly sad, whereas your erstwhile colleagues always have this thing where they are correct and GOOD, so anyone who does not share their view totally is not just wrong but EVIL. The idea that anyone could have an honest independent position is anathema to both sides.