This Wretched Hive Of Scum And Villainy

[Cassius]

Can we change the title to That Wretched Hive of Scum and Villainy?

[Cassius]

I believe that Peter Aldous has also submitted a letter now.

[Cassius]

I'm wondering if there are any good books to learn about the conservative parties recent history ? preferably from someone which isn't written from an obviously partisan lense

The Conservative Party from Thatcher to Cameron by Tim Bale is a reasonably good summary of the period 1990-2010, although it was written and thus breaks off even before the coalition so it’s now a little dated (as is Bale’s boostering for the political dead end of ‘modernisation’, but that’s another story). I’ve not really read a lot of books about the politics of the last decade - the books in the Nuffield Elections Series about the elections of the last decade are good but very pricey unless you have free access to Springer Link. I enjoyed reading Tim Shipman’s accounts of the EU referendum and the first year of the May ministry but I believe that others on here have their doubts about those books and about Shipman. The inevitable problem really with any account of ‘recent’ politics is that it ages faster than a Mummy exposed to the elements, so they usually end up looking a little silly even a year or two down the line.

[Cassius]

Note of course that the three most popular ministers are also the three who hold the non-domestic policy focused portfolios (well, International Trade is a bit of both but also an area that the media and most voters don’t pay much attention to).

[Cassius]

On the other hand, Morton does fit the profile of ‘vacuous Tory woman’ a tad too well. She even went to the Open University.

[Cassius]

Beresford will be seventy-eight when the next election rolls round (assuming the parliament lasts a full term) so it's not surprising that he's chosen to retire, especially given how bad the situation is for the party. As for McPartland, he was (as far as I'm aware) the only Tory to vote against the strikes bill earlier this year, so his decision to call it a day is not surprising either.

In other news, "a leading Conservative business figure" (whom nobody has ever heard of and who founded a PR firm, which I'm not sure qualifies him for the title of "leading business figure"), Iain Anderson, has quit the party due to the transgender issue (amongst other reasons), citing the government's decision to block that Scottish gender recognition law and claiming "it's not the party it used to be". Which is... interesting, because apparently he joined the party forty years ago and if that's the case I'm not sure what kind of party he thought he was joining in 1983.

[Cassius]

Not the biggest news this week - but we have another retirement:
https://mobile.twitter.com/WalkerWorcester/status/1631679809075003392
Walker represents one of those seats that was Tory under Thatcher and Major, Labour under all three Blair wins, and has voted Conservative ever since.

A one-nation conservative (so much so he married the CEO of one of Tony Blair’s foundations), he’s another loss for the centrist wing of the party - although, with a majority of only 6,700, in a classic bellwether seat, he was probably gone anyway.

He’s also part of an odd small faction who pushed to hold an EU Referendum in 2014, but ended up backing Remain in 2016.

**

Also, worth saying - intrigued by Conservatopia’s breakdown of the factional war in the party. It really does seem like the party is doomed to stay split between some variation on Thatcher’s infamous “drys” and “wets”, generation after generation.

As an addendum, Walker happens to be the son of Thatcher’s ex-Viceroy of Wales and all-round Heathite and Wet Peter Walker, who also represented Worcester for many years.

Anyway, I enjoyed Conservatopia’s take on the Tory factions. My two pence would simply be that most of the Tory ‘moderates’ are either posh or people who’ve done the traditional uni-to-professional-career-in-London pipeline (or both) and thus want to remain on good terms with the liberal establishment in this country, whereas the headbangers generally very much aren’t either of those things. Isn’t a fixed rule of course (see Rees-Mogg, Jacob) and there is an age and time of election divide (much older posh and/or professional MPs being more likely to be headbangers). There’s also an element of sinistrism at work (Hague used to be considered much more right-wing, but now that he’s achieved ‘grandee’ status he’s now a leading ‘Tory moderate’).

I’d also argue that it’s pointless to try and categorise people like the Tub of Lard and E.T. in Drag, given that their North Star is ‘gib me attention pls’ and thus will say and do literally anything.

[Cassius]

The Conservatives are quite funny in that their civil service (the collection of bag carriers, CCHQ staffers, 'think tank researchers') is generally more economically right wing but generally progressive on LGBT rights and other issues.

Meanwhile in THIGMOO for years the civil service was seen as largely brownite and then err weirdly right wing in a rather aggressive sense- it does seem to be reverting back to type.

I wouldn’t say that the social liberalism is particularly surprising, given the vast overabundance of gay men and posh women in university Conservative associations, the pipeline from which many of the bag carriers are recruited. As for the free market fetishism, again, not hugely surprising given that young Tories are often drawn into the party via a passing acquaintance with the Thatcher administration, whilst the Think Tankers (like all Think Tankers from any part of the political spectrum) are unencumbered by the need to keep one foot in the reality based community, unlike most MPs.

[Cassius]

One other interesting tid-bit on the electoral front - a couple of journalists have poked around the news that marginal seat MPs are increasingly looking towards safe seats, and it appears that there's been a formal process set up for those who are looking to participate in the "chicken run". Initially, this seems to have been set up by CCHQ to assist MPs who have been "displaced" by boundary reviews, but there's a sense that some MPs are exploiting the system in an attempt to survive.

We already knew Nicola Richardson (West Bromwich East) and Stuart Anderson (Wolverhampton South West) were looking to take that route, but Keiran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) sounds like he'll flee to Chester South and Eddisbury. Scott Benton (Blackpool South) is being very cagey about whether he'll stay in Blackpool or try elsewhere (*insert joke about what a great loss to politics Benton will be here*). And Eddie Hughes looks likely to leave Walsall to try for Chris Pincher's seat of Tamworth - assuming there isn't a by-election in the next 18 months...

Some of those seats are quite marginal, but only Eddie Hughes can really claim to have been "displaced" by the boundary review.

The nomination in Sajid Javid's safe Bromsgrove seat seems like it'll be a brawl between several incumbents. And a three-way fight for a safe Hampshire seat between Suella Braverman, Paul Holmes and Flick Drummond seems inevitable.

I think there are two safe Hampshire seats between those three.  The obvious thing to do would be for Holmes to take the revised Eastleigh, Braverman to take Hamble Valley and Drummond to take Fareham & Waterlooville.  But Eastleigh will be a Lib Dem target again and Holmes apparently wants Hamble Valley, and the view seems to be that he's likely to get it, leaving the other two fighting over Fareham & Waterlooville.

Fareham & Waterlooville would be a peak Canadian riding name if you cut out the “&” and made it Fareham-Waterlooville.

[Cassius]

Does she want to be fired in order to be the darling of the Tory far right?

She definitely seems to be auditioning for the top job right now. The speech that's being trailed in this article was the one she gave this afternoon at the "National Conservatism" conference. It went way outside of her government brief, and was full of really weird stuff designed to enamour her to hard-right of the membership and base.

It included such zingers as this bizarre swing at Starmer: “Given his definition of a woman we can’t rule him out from running as Labour first woman prime minister.”

As well as several attempts to lay out her ideology in full. “I understand the goal of conservatism is to protect fundamental rights…the left sees the purpose of politics to eradicate the existence of inequality even if this is at the expense of individual liberty and flourishing.”

Seems like she wants to be Leader of the Opposition, really badly. Ironically, I think Ed Davey and Suella Braverman both dream of her being the next leader of the Conservatives, given what she could do to their chances in seats like those of Michael Gove and Jeremy Hunt.

The 1990s called, they want their internally dysfunctional Tory party back.

The 90s was plain sailing in comparison to the current situation.

[Cassius]

I would not be shocked if we see a Braverman leadership bid before the next election.

[Cassius]

Sunak contriving to avoid PMQs both this week and next. Not hard to read things into that.

Aye - I saw several journalists point out that he’s now on track to have the poorest PMQs attendance in modern times:

Liz Truss was the Sam Allardyce of PMQs.

[Cassius]

Would pay good money to see big Sam at PMQs. A solid Labour man if I recall too.

I think Allardyce has voted for both parties, plus he’s had warm words for leaving the EU and Donald Trump in the past. It would be good to see him as Chancellor, as then we’d also get to see the legendary pint of wine at the despatch box on the budget day.

[Cassius]

Read some grumbling re Sir Shut up and go Away getting reselected for a much safer seat.

I was surprised he was restanding as he seems like the type who only thrives when he’s in power and when the Government are- perhaps he wants to rebuild his political image?

I think the appropriate question would be what does Sir Falsetto have to offer in any role other than that of parliamentarian? He’ll have plenty of fodder for scheming and rat******* whilst in opposition so I’m sure that prospect suits him just fine.

[Cassius]

This has David Cameron's fingerprints all over it

It doesn't. Cameron totally disappeared after leaving office and tried to attract the least attention possible since then.

Moreover, if certain appendages had entered certain cavities, allegedly, then the alleged in-law of the alleged proprietor of the alleged cavity would have no reason to bring this to wider attention… allegedly.

[Cassius]

The Wallace for PM speculation was always laughable given that, quite apart from the rumours, he was one of the stupidest people in the cabinet.

[Cassius]

I get why gambling addiction disqualifies you from being PM, but it doesn't seem to be that scandalous to merit a media blackout on the subject. Am I missing something?

There are other rumours, shall we say.

[Cassius]

There’s a Westminster colloquialism for it that shares its initials with a certain paramilitary organisation that operated in Europe during the first half of the twentieth century.

[Cassius]

Why would Payne immediately want to jump from think tank gig to MP so soon after leaving the journalistic gig? It seems like his revolving door is at maximum speed. Is he bored already?

Given how many big beasts (actually that’s probably a misnomer, let’s call them big pygmies) are retiring or going to be defeated at the next election, Payne’s chances of a rapid ascent through the ranks of a Tory opposition are probably pretty good, if he manages to secure a safe seat. He’s also young enough that he can afford to hang around on the opposition benches for a decade or so before the Tories have their next go with the rattle.

[Cassius]

Oh well, at least we won't get the excruciatingly cringey photo-ops with Sunak now.

They were saying on TV how disrespectful it was that Rishi wasn’t there. William I can understand, but would the experience of either the players or the fans have been improved my having an unpopular, uncharismatic prime minister there?

The Beast of Perpetual Outrage must be fed.

[Cassius]

Truss’ problem is that she simply isn’t articulate and entertaining (or, frankly, intelligent) enough to make it on the right-wing intellectual circuit.

[Cassius]

I don’t think selecting more candidates like Liz Truss, Anna Soubry and Amber Rudd is the surefire way to win back support that these alleged ‘grandees’ think it is.

[Cassius]

I mean, if it comes from MI5 (or from any source in the British defence establishment) than we can safely say it’s wrong.

[Cassius]

It would be ideal if all journalists were barred from attending all political and government events. A step in the right direction.

[Cassius]

Following May’s speech to the fringes defending Net Zero and Truss doing, well, everything she’s done this week, Sunak has completed the set, with public criticism from Johnson and Cameron.
https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson/status/1709672651789066591
First time they’ve publicly agreed in quite some time. Johnson would shake hands with Lenin if it screwed over Sunak, but Cameron’s pretty determined not to criticise his successors. So it’s quite a break to see him as combative as he is here.

Given the empty cupboard that is Cameron’s legacy (such that he has to resort to rolling out same-sex marriage every time he’s asked about his proudest achievement in office), it’s not surprising that he’s put his head above the parapet in defence of HS2, since it was given the go ahead under his government and would (if it were ever to be finished) be one of the few lasting achievements of said government.

Anyway, I’m supportive of scrapping the Birmingham-Manchester leg, given that it seems to have become a giant money pit of dubious economic value. As far I’m aware construction hasn’t even begun, so I think there’s a good chance that some of our posters might be dead by the time they cut the ribbon on it, and who knows what our economy and patterns of commuting will look like by then. One of the things about Sunak that I appreciate is his willingness to begin to dial back on the grandiose and ill-thought out schemes we’ve been lumbered with by successive governments over the last decade and a half (see Net Zero), even if the smoking and education pronouncements are a bit questionable.