Can it just be a coincidence that most of the leading figures of the Tory left lost their seats, while the coming women and men of the right largely held on? Kemi Badenoch, Robert Jenrick and Suella Braverman all made it back to the Commons while whole phalanxes of would-be leadership contenders from the ‘One Nation’ wing of the party fell by the wayside. Penny Mordaunt, Grant Shapps, Alex Chalk and Gillian Keegan were among the biggest casualties.
The coming civil war for the soul of the Tories is shaping up to be a humdinger
Perhaps having anti-woke and mass-migration sceptic credentials helped those on the right minimise the Reform vote in their patches and thus avoid a bloodbath that Nigel Farage had far more to do with than Keir Starmer did.
For it was Farage’s dynamic revolt on the right, rather than Starmer’s underwhelming Labour trickle forward, in terms of vote share, that changed the electoral arithmetic in so many seats.
Robert Buckland set the tone for bitter outpourings from centrist Tories when he launched into a self-congratulatory concession speech that implied he and his ilk were too good for the rough old trade of right-wing politics. He clearly had Braverman chiefly in mind when attacking the indiscipline of colleagues. Yet she won her seat – and he lost his.
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Jonathan Sacerdoti
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If there was no stand-out ‘Portillo’ moment of this election that was largely because the television coverage was so poor, with numerous declarations missed or abandoned owing to issues with sound quality or over-running studio waffle-fests. Mordaunt was very gracious in defeat, though one was tempted to whistle at the chunky dimensions of the Reform vote that doomed her.
So the leadership contest that will shortly get under way will have to do so without the great south coast sword carrier. Tom Tugendhat looks the most likely champion of the left and will no doubt seek a right-wing ‘running mate’ to make himself more palatable to the Tory grassroots.
Badenoch got home with a majority of well under 3,000 in North West Essex. She was perhaps saved by her would-be nemesis, David Tennant, when he demanded that she should cease to exist on account of her trans views and hence reminded many voters why she was worth supporting. Now, unburdened from the shackles of being a minister in Rishi Sunak’s cabinet, she has the chance to show she has the ideas and the mettle to be the saviour of the Tories.
It is difficult to fathom how it cannot be obvious to every Conservative that it was failing to compete with Farage and his allies for the votes of right-wing people that cost them dearly. And yet the old drumbeat about needing to tack back to the fabled centre-ground has struck up again as allies and protégés of George Osborne fan out across the airwaves.
The coming civil war for the soul of the Tories is shaping up to be a humdinger. But perhaps momentum now lies with the right, due to the simple fact that so many on the left failed to get themselves re-elected.
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