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Monday 13 October 2008

Web Extra: The Tories should fear the dynamic new team of professionals that Brown is assembling

The absence of campaign veterans creates of a lack of “institutional memory”, says one staffer. Dowden, in particular, was renowned for his encyclopaedic knowledge of past strategies. There is a feeling of being dragged into a succession of short-term battles – a sense of permanent crisis meetings. The good news is that the Tories are doing better, usually winning these day-to-day fights. But inside Tory head office, staff who are given a few days to rush out policy fear this is being done to the exclusion of a wider narrative.

Take, for example, Mr Cameron’s pledge last month to clear parks of teenage gangs so children are better able to play outside. This was inspired not to highlight any principle, but by an internal polling presentation from Lord Ashcroft showing that Mr Cameron is losing the support of mothers. More proposals, on subjects like maternity leave, are on the way. Prisons on Monday, defence on Tuesday — the party hops from one topic to another with little time taken to hammer any point home.

‘You can get it if you really want’ runs the current Tory advertising slogan. But get what? The problem is not that Mr Cameron has no answer. The problem is that he has about a dozen — and cannot narrow them down. Many of his policies, such as welfare reform, are radical and urgently needed. Some are worth casting a Tory vote just to see them enacted, such as Michael Gove’s promise of school reform. But no policy has yet been explained in a way the ordinary voter can understand. 

Parties can handle, at most, three messages at election time – and these messages need to be forged two years beforehand. This was Lynton Crosby’s complaint when called in to work for Michael Howard. One cannot fatten a pig before market day, he would say. Even Tory officials who hated Crosby’s strategy talk about how the leadership during that period was exemplary. “It was like firing a gun”, one said. “You’d have the target, fashion the bullet, detonate. Easy, clear instructions.”

Mr Crosby is now working for Boris Johnson’s Mayoral campaign and could – in theory – be available to Mr Cameron after May. But this is not seen as a likely option. He would want to be the Alpha Male in a central office which already suffers from having “too many hands on the steering wheel” as one aide puts it. Nor is he understood to be a fan of Mr Cameron.  

More articles from: Fraser Nelson | this section

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