Samizdata

There is an unintentionally insightful article on Unherd by Will Lloyd called Meet Britain’s radical New Right, written from a predictably wet Tory perspective. We are told conservatives with what are fairly conventional conservative views are radical, and moreover new. And that tells us much about orthodox high status opinion in the UK.

I should have stopped reading at “Brexit has failed”.

For most voters, Brexit was about sovereignty according to Ashcroft exit poll, meaning Westminster has nowhere to hide. So, pace Will Lloyd & Nigel Farage alike, we at least got that, mission accomplished. Brexit wasn’t what you thought it was and it still isn’t. What comes next is not ‘Brexit’, it’s just politics; there is no undoing Brexit this side of perpetual civil war.

Much as the author sneers at the Right (whatever that means when not talking about France circa 1790), Jeremy Hunt’s “Conservative” Party is not small-c conservative in any shape, way, or form. The Tories have driven a stake through their own heart, ending any pretence of being a ‘broad church’, because if they were, Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng would still be in Downing Street in spite of straying from the Blue Blairite orthodoxy. Hell, they were defenestrated in no small part for trying to put the top rate of tax back to where it was for 12 years under the last Labour government. That’s radical apparently.

If you want less tax; even slightly less state control of anything at all; no taking the knee; no eco-pandering to the Net Zero cult; an energy policy that allows fracking and expanding North Sea production rather than one that could have been written by Vladimir Putin; no talk of ‘reparations’ (climate or otherwise), why would anyone who wants those things vote Tory? No reason, and they won’t.

The party membership voted for Truss but they got Sunak anyway. Okay, message received, everyone now knows what the party nomenklatura & apparatchiks think of the rank-and-file party membership. The members might as well have voted for Larry the Cat as party leader for all the difference it made, at least he’s still in Downing Street.

Voting Tory in last general election was essential when the alternative was Corbyn, the most odious mainstream politician since Oswald Mosley (for some of the same reasons). But Keir Starmer is just another dreary Blairite, he’s Jeremy Hunt without the unfortunate China connections. Then the choice is vote for Blue Blairites who likes high taxes and ruinous green policies, or Red Blairites who likes high taxes, ruinous green policies, and don’t know what a woman is. On the plus side, Labour have Diane Abbott, who can take over Boris’ role providing comic relief.

So, I will be voting Reform UK, because at this point, I couldn’t care less which flavour of technocratic Blairite is in Downing Street. Jeremy Hunt and his ilk can get stuffed. Sure, Labour will get in and it won’t be pretty unless ginger growlers are your thing. But perhaps, just perhaps, utterly burning the Tories to the ground might let something better emerge from the ashes.

Will Lloyd no doubt thinks that’s crazy talk, given that without any detectable irony he wrote of this ‘radical new right’:

“Do not expect them to sculpt a future of fair dealing, pragmatism, patience, moderation or high intelligence”

Imagine thinking the soaking wet dunderheads running the Tory Party as of late 2022 represent even a single one of those presumed virtues. It’s not called the Stupid Party for nothing.

The Tory party has become ‘culturally inbred’ and starts to resemble the deranged Hillbillies of Hollywood myth, just with shirts from Jermyn Street and a better wine list. People like Crispin Blunt et al seem to believe they have a natural right to be in charge because… well, just because. Even marginally democratic input like the Conservative Party members choosing Liz Truss is intolerable as they wanted Rishi Sunak. This of course also explains why Brexit drove them into the florid stage of insanity, given the oiks simply refused to do what their betters had told them to do.

So, Liz Truss is now a sock-puppet for her political rival, a PM in office but not in power. Perhaps a stronger woman would have resisted the pressure and turned things around even at this late stage, but we now know Liz Truss is not such a woman. She seems to have naively assumed that having forced out Boris (who to be fair set the stage of this entire shitshow), the same people would then abide by the Party membership’s wishes and allow her to actual govern.

The absurdly named Conservative Party is in the midst of a CFIT (controlled flight into terrain) due to its internal ideological contradictions. Far from being a broad church, the Wets, better described as Blue Blairites, people with more in common with LibDems or pre-Corbyn Labour Party than the free-market low tax wing of the party, have decided only they are fit to be in power.

That’s it, one hundred years on from 1922 the Tories as currently understood are doomed. They need to crash and burn and indeed they will. The Labour government that will follow is going to be economically and culturally even worse (which given how crap the Tories have been will a remarkable achievement, but I believe Labour is absolutely up to the task). But the destruction of the Conservative Party we know has to happen. We have just arrived at the end point of where 30 years of “lesser evil” voting has led us.

Right then, what eventually comes next 5 to 10 years from now after Labour take their turn to trash the nation? Hard to say but at least we can’t blame the EU now. Perhaps something that calls itself the Conservative Party under Kemi Badanoch will arise from the ashes? A Conservative Party that is actually is a conservative party? Or maybe Reform UK? Perhaps something else entirely? I really don’t know.

Addendum: And Truss is gone. She had some of the right ideas but proved to be as useful as a chocolate teapot politically. Perhaps that is unkind, and given the now toxic internal contradictions in the Party have fully manifested. It was a poison chalice no matter who was the leader. The enforcers of Blue Blairite orthodoxy are determined to destroy the party and that is that, all we can do it watch the unedifying spectacle unfold.

It is often said the Conservative Party is a ‘broad church’ and not just a party of free marketeers. This was certainly true back when Margert Thatcher was party leader, given she had to endure the likes of Michael Heseltine et al.

But the de facto coup d’état by ‘Wets’ (better described these days as ‘Blue Blairites’) has left Elizabeth Truss as Prime Minister in name only. She has proven to be weak, a lady very much for turning; unable to even reduce the top tax rate to where it was for 12 years under the last Labour government. And plans to cancel an increase in corporation tax during a recession have also been stymied. So, safe to say the Tory Party is not sufficiently broad church to include actual small-c conservatives, because anyone suggesting a lower tax future is not going to be allowed to run the show no matter what. The Tory WANCs (Tories Who Are Not Conservatives) have demonstrated they are very much in control.

In the recent internal election, the party membership rejected Rishi Sunak, the policy continuity candidate most of the Parliamentary party wanted, instead choosing Truss, who wanted to try something different. But the Blue Blairites would have none of it. If the party members were unwilling to vote the way they were told to, the grandees would just strongarm Truss’ chancellor of choice out of office and replace him with Jeremy Hunt, an unrepentant Remainer, Sinophile, and distilled essence of Blue Blairite Blob.

So please, do not ever say the Tory Party is a broad church because it is not. And if you say it to my face, I will do my best to defenestrate you. A few weeks ago, I was certain to vote Tory again. Now, not only will I not, I will vote against them as the party deserves to not just defeat but to be crushed. The aftermath will be grim given the alternatives, but not only it is inevitable, it is probably necessary. The absurdly named Conservative Party as currently understood need to burn so there is at least a possibility something better can take its place.