Are we about to witness a Tory revival in the UK? There has been much talk of this in recent weeks. With the New Labour government under fire for its performance on public services and transport, and UK prime minister Tony Blair out and about on the world stage, there have been easy pickings for Tory spokesmen.
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And yet, as the UK Guardian revealed on 22 January, this is not reflected in the opinion polls (1). 'Teflon Tony' has maintained his approval ratings. When asked by ICM which of the three main leaders would make the best prime minister, 51 percent chose Blair. While his poll rating has fallen from the dizzy heights of immediately post-11 September, it is still higher than in May 2001, just before the general election (44 percent). Meanwhile, Conservative Party leader Iain Duncan Smith (14 percent) and the Liberal Democrats' Charles Kennedy (15 percent) battle for a distant second place in the hearts of the electorate.
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The Guardian expressed great surprise at this lack of response from the electorate, in part because the paper's own comment pages have been busy with talk of a Tory recovery. How can it be, they ask, that none of the criticism of recent weeks has dented either Blair's ratings or that of his government? (2) The answer has much more to do with the nature of politics under New Labour than with the Tories.
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The fact that Duncan Smith may or may not be performing better in the House of Commons is irrelevant. Most commentators agreed that former Tory leader William Hague consistently outshone Blair at the Despatch Box for years before the last election and was still soundly trounced at the polls. Blair is a fairly humourless moralist who would make a balloon on a stick look like a satirical genius by comparison. And in any case, political life has bypassed parliament for some time now.
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The problem is the gulf that exists between the electorate and the business of politics. Who you vote for has little relevance to the state of public services, the economy or anything else. For example, much of the criticism of New Labour in recent weeks has been directed at its plans to use private and overseas hospitals to try to cut waiting lists, and to raise the possibility of private hospitals running NHS services. In essence, these are a direct continuation of the Conservative Party's health reforms.
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The current government has consistently attempted to remove ideology from political life by promoting a managerial style of politics. As the UK Independent's Donald Macintyre points out in relation to the current furore over Rose Addis, the 94-year-old woman whose supposed neglect by a London hospital sparked a national row about the quality of care provided by the NHS, '... it isn't rational to expect the secretary of state for health to be responsible for micro-managing the throughput in casualty at the Whittington [Hospital]' (3).
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 | | More than 40 percent of people did not vote at all |
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Yet this is precisely the upshot of government policy. Tory opposition, meanwhile, has been reduced to the charge of incompetence. This is not going to inspire deep and lasting support for either side. But it's the Tories who have to make the case for change.
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The Guardian goes on to suggest that this poll is a reflection of Blair's personal authority. And it is true that many Conservative and Liberal Democrat voters think Blair is the best available candidate to be prime minister. But that should not be confused with authority. It is worth remembering just how little popular support Blair has. Although he holds a massive majority in the House of Commons, his government received the support of just 24.2 percent of the electorate. More than 40 percent did not bother to vote at all.
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Everybody talks about how Blair has developed a presidential style in which he puts himself above politics. We should know by now that nothing sticks to 'Teflon Tony'. But this separation of personality from politics is itself symptomatic of the gulf between the political class and the electorate - a gulf that the government, with its painful attempts to find new ways of 'connecting', is only too aware of. The government's sense of isolation and insecurity means that, despite facing no opposition worthy of the name, it cannot hold the line even on policies closest to its heart. Recent examples include changes to anti-terrorism legislation and the withdrawal of the proposal to restrict trial by jury.
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The recent stories about a Tory revival have much to do with wishful thinking. Political commentators would love to put pressure on the government to do more, to sort out the mess. They see the presence of a real electoral opposition as a way of doing that, and if one doesn't exist it will just have to be invented. Unfortunately, in the absence of new ideas and a political strategy, the Tories just aren't up to it.
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The best thing that anybody can say about Iain Duncan Smith is that he is not like Michael Foot, he's more like Neil Kinnock. In other words, the first Tory Party moderniser, not the last old-fashioned electoral disaster. Well, for the record Kinnock lost two elections as leader, one by a landslide. That's hardly a vote of confidence.
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Read on:
The War of Rose's Socks, by Dr Michael Fitzpatrick
spiked issue: Election 2001
(1) 'Teflon Tony' defies the mood of crisis , Guardian, 22 January 2002
(2) Reality check, Guardian, 22 January 2002
(3) 'If only politicians would keep their hands off the NHS', Independent, 24 January 2002
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