Conservatives

  • Thatcher knew the potential of close working

    The Conservatives are said to have had a strained relationship with most public bodies. In fact, Margaret Thatcher said she liked to see it as a “partnership” so that she could explore it further. If she could get into a boardroom, she’d get into their heads. This helped her to “understand their thinking, and to know them better,” she once concluded. It’s a belief that served her well.

    In our time, we’ve got to keep going with what she started. All the public bodies that make up our lives are meant to be aligned with our purposes. It’s important that we keep them close, and never push them too far away. It minimises harm and increases the potential of true leadership. This is something we’re desperately in need of.

  • The Conservatives and Reform have set out their stalls

    At this juncture, the two leading small-c conservative parties have set out their stalls.

    The Conservatives have said they’ll back big business but for the benefit of consumers, meaning it’ll make it easier to transact but for better value. This seems to be its position.

    The Reform side have come out recently for small business, saying they’ll back entrepreneurs that serve a more local customer base. This is in support of its large support base centred on affordable living.

    The two parties then have a way to reach voters, and it’s an angle that makes sense on their side of the political divide.

  • Profile: George Orwell

    George Orwell was born in India, but raised in England and schooled at Eton College as a young man. His writing career began in earnest in the 1920’s and 1930’s.

    Orwell said, like many of his peers, he only found comfort in thinking about socialism. He said it made him feel better about life.

    However, privately, he stuck avowedly to conservative principles by himself, even if he disagreed with its ideas in practice.

  • Michael Heseltine is a cheap impresario

    It’s alleged that the Heseltine that we’re told to know and love is not the Heseltine of reality. It’s the comment Lady Thatcher made to me in the years she spent in a political wilderness following her demise from UK political life.

    She often spoke of people, and many names came up in our “coffee conversations”, as she called them. She knew about the hatred of public life, and the corruption ripped through every other walk of life. She knew she got labels she didn’t deserve, and many more besides that she didn’t like.

    Her memories were apt, and faithfully reported the true drama of the times. Heseltine was someone she always found it unfortunate to remember. She said he was a bad example in private and in public. It’s believed he was a mastermind behind much of the conspiracy that straddled her Premiership. “He’s also disliked anywhere else I go,” she once said, soberly.

    His recent comments about Nigel Farage MP (Clacton/Reform UK) are ill-advised. He clearly doesn’t understand the situation on the ground, as it were. He whips up hatred as if he is an Enoch Powell type of figure himself, which is more than likely. There are many secret extremists in Parliament who just plot against us. Farage is the latest target in his book.

  • The UK media routinely sabotages us

    The experience of most people in this country is now typified by the results of deep-seated cynicism.

    In our terms, this is the Journalism we’ve got used to.

    I’ve known potential A-level students turned away from Sixth Form because their form of politics isn’t liked anymore.

    I’ve known job applicants laughed at for saying they’re a conservative because the newspaper that decides for them has moved on.

    This country is populated by people betrayed by the greedy, and the negligent.

    These are the sorts that call themselves Journalists, and yet only have a Land Rover to show for it.

    The homogenous nature of Politics is designed to betray us. It helps Labour for this to be the case.

  • The Conservatives are showing signs of revival

  • Can the Conservatives control people movement?

    The Conservatives have their annual conference starting today, and the timing is apt. There is a crisis in every sphere of government. The Labour party has swept into power for a moment in time, but despite spending pledges and effort to ease it, the Dover Crossings crisis is continuing to bite at the nation’s patience.

    A graphic provided by the UK Conservative party showing a 7-point plan (via @Conservatives, X).

    The plans set out by the Conservatives now seem to show its approach is taking shape. The push for exit from international agreements and further innovations to touch base with illegal entrants into our country are bold moves at a status quo. Yet the future is a far flung thing. Its task is to either convince the government, or get in front of the country.

  • Badenoch needs to step up

    The demise of support for the Conservatives happened under a Prime Minister that sought a populist agenda. This is not the sort that is breaking news in America, but the kind that’s noticed here. It comes up in meetings and it becomes the context of government work. The trouble is it’s not popular.

    The tendency of Conservatives to come out with weird ideas hasn’t abated. The majority of proposed policy is conspiracy theory wrapped up in the moment. It’s for the crowd out in the cold. It’s for those who wish for just a slither of a vision. This isn’t real politics.

    The notion that something new is the arrival of a solution is old hat stump canvassing. It can’t live beyond the odd front door that will hear no more of it after it’s shut. The real driver of change is change itself. The message gets through that efficiency is improving and problems are resolved over time.

    This builds voter confidence. It seeds trust in politics. It makes elections winnable. The task ahead is for Badenoch to prove that she’s capable of doing something different herself. It’s not an appeal but an objective. It’s in the form of a broad directive. It’s a final notice on laziness. It’s a check on apathy.

  • Thatcher’s words are charged with promise

    Margaret Thatcher was known to play a huge role in politics before her death. Like many other Tories, she continued to encourage party members to get on through disputes.

    “The sense of opposition one feels,” she once quipped, “is too much for some.” There is truth written in that statement for many today.

    It’s an overwhelming privilege but a heavy burden that many feel after an election win. The heaviest issues of the day are on the table. It takes perseverance.

    Thatcher was overheard consoling a party member who was finding it tough to campaign. “I’m sorry they haven’t understood yet,” she began, “but they do know, and that’s better than nothing.”

    It can be a tough having to walk the streets to see no interest in your platform. Yet a party is there as a vehicle of support. Long may they all continue.

  • Thatcher’s love for the UK is noble

    Margaret Thatcher is a misunderstood, maligned figure in UK politics. There aren’t many that understand her approach to politics in the country at large.

    If on the spot she said things to unite a party together. If on her own, she supported the basics of the state stoically.

    Her support for the NHS, for example, is now lore in its quarters. She’s regarded as an intellectual for its ways and means. Many remember her cause.

    The television reports don’t do her justice, but hints of her ethic are found in her speeches.

    She warmed to crowds much different to her own. She passed away knowing she’d helped the many types of people here.

  • Badenoch is looking for the blue brick road

    The issue worrying the leadership of Kemi Badenoch is a crisis in support for the purpose of conservatism in the UK.

    Its storied history is not the only point now but its engagement with the modern world.

    Its survival relies on getting the votes to make itself into a party of governance.

    In a conservative world your base counts as your source for ideas, resilience to opposing values, views, and visions, and the strength to carry through big changes to the political system.

    While Reform UK has the potential, it falls short in having the clout. The trouble Badenoch has with her party is the ‘brand’ suffers for not being supported widely.

    The work of the party is not seen as pervasive anymore, and its preeminence is damaged by the furtive activity of others.

    It means it lacks clarity in its pitch.

    To see success and return to real influence in UK politics, the Conservatives need to drive enthusiasm for more of what they did before, marking out large schemes for the entire country.

  • Profile: Rishi Sunak MP

    Former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, born of parents of Indian descent, was educated at Winchester College and later the University of Oxford, where he studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at Lincoln College.

    His role as an analyst at Goldman Sachs, and with two hedge funds, prepared him for his later work in politics. His Chancellorship during the Covid-19 crisis brought out his shrewd side, in making public spending manoeuvres.

    His Premiership began in October 2022 and drove home his ambition to be a modern leader. He addressed issues such as AI, international trade, and crime. His loss in 2024 showed deep fissures in the Conservative party.

  • Why MAGAn’s still watch current events

    It’s a myth in rural America that elites do anything wrong. At least, it’s what I was told. The lady was urgent, and sincere in saying it.

    She was beset with life problems, but she felt compelled to worry about what she’d heard these selfsame elites do.

    It was before a Facebook-inspired era of paranoia over fake news and false influence. It was prior to Donald Trump and before the Jan 6 attack. It meant more than it does now.

    It was symbolic of an emerging problem among ordinary Americans who felt that as bad as things got, there may still be answers to find out.

    It’s this belief – to seek the truth to conspiracy theories – that motivates most who fit the bill of a MAGA advocate that loves Donald Trump to watch news coverage.

    I was once told that they see him as an “engine” at work that drives to make news happen in their interests. It can work both ways.

  • Profile: Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg

    Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg is a former MP for Somerset. He anchors a show on GB News, a smaller, UK-based news channel. He’s got over 7,000 subscribers to his Substack, Letters from an Englishman by Jacob Rees-Mogg, which has multimedia posts.

    Sir Jacob is known as a vibrant character, and showed it in and around Westminster. He’s often fronted traditional causes, and likes to provoke controversy. He’s a devout Catholic. He often speaks about his moral convictions in political discussions.

  • Tories voting problem

    The Conservatives have made some progress because of the PR mishaps of the present Labour government. Kemi Badenoch MP (North West Essex/Conservatives), its new leader, has shaped a hard campaign against its farm tax.

    The overriding allegations of sleaze, corruption, and mismanagement have also not gone away, and prove useful to her.

    However, her main problem is a stubborn one. The party lost a significant vote share to Reform UK, who got 14.8% of it back in July. It shut the door on government for the Tories to some extent, and it’s not likely to get it back.

    Badenoch has to win over her voters to compensate for the loss, and find some more to fill the gap.