‘If we don’t like modern Britain, then it is very unlikely that modern Britain will like us’ says Damian Green, in a piece for the Daily Telegraph today. I’m not sure if this is a piece of pre-reshuffle positioning or a cri de coeur, but his analysis is about ten years out of date. Green is not a Notting Hill Tory, he’s part of the group whom Rachel Sylvester once described as the ‘Blueberry Hill’ Tories — a generation born about the same time as the Fats Domino hit, who got into parliament early enough to see their party spanked by Tony Blair in three general elections. This gave rise to the ‘modernisers’, whose analysis was right for the time. But now, this group seem to be focused on providing ever-better ways to win the 2001 election. Very little of this is likely to help the Tories in 2015.
Green challenges the Tories to pass the ‘Danny Boyle’ test, which is an new way of phrasing a new argument: that Britain is multi-racial, socially liberal, a quarter of kids are brought up by single mothers nowadays so the Tories ought to come to terms with this, and stop yearning for a better yesterday.
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