Politics

17 January 2009

Fraser Nelson reviews the week in politics

David Cameron has long been keen for his shadow Cabinet to exude greater empathy with recession-struck Britain — and he has inadvertently succeeded in one important regard. Most are now fearful of losing their jobs. The coming reshuffle is being spoken of like a vicious redundancy plan that could claim any scalp at random. Frontbenchers anxiously read and decode newspaper stories — particularly for the latest word on Ken Clarke’s potential return and what that might mean. The suspense is agonising.

Reshuffle speculation is normally a media game. This time, few shadow ministers have been able to wish each other happy new year without then discussing for whom, precisely, it will be most happy. The febrile atmosphere has itself shed intriguing light on the nervous system (and nervous state) of the Conservatives, the relationship between the party and its high command, and the direction in which power is shifting.

None of this can be explained without reference to the Norman Shaw South building, the adopted home of the Cameroons. It is only seven minutes away from the Commons chamber, via a bridge, a lift and a tunnel, but it has come to represent a quite separate inner sanctum where power rests and decisions are taken. George Osborne, Oliver Letwin and their respective staffs are based here — a sort of Downing Street-in-waiting. The rest of the front bench is dotted around the parliamentary complex — sometimes in clusters, elsewhere in isolation.

David Starkey made his name as a Tudor historian by demonstrating the importance of the layout of Henry VIII’s court to its politics and factions. He would find precisely the same principles at work today in Parliament. This is why, in the Strangers’ Bar, one hears grumbles that Norman Shaw South is a closed clique, ‘Dave’s Nest’. But, comes the retort, shadow Cabinet members are begged to get involved, to give up their second jobs and get stuck in. Many don’t. So this leaves those in the supposed Cameroon ‘nest’ to do the heavy lifting.

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