The election has yet to be fought, let alone lost, but already the Tory would-be leaders are circling Rishi Sunak. And among the most energetic on the circuit is Penny Mordaunt. The other day, she was having a go at the SNP at the Caledonian Club; it’s always useful to play the unionist card in this particular game. Few observers doubt that she’s taking up where she left off in the last leadership campaign where she was just 10 MP votes shy of making it onto the ballot against Rishi. She comes second in the ConservativeHome ranking of cabinet ministers, despite having done precisely nothing in the way of substance — and, fair enough, she’s Leader of the Commons.
Trouble is, the hurly burly isn’t done yet and quite a lot might happen between now and, let’s say, November. But whatever the question is about the future of the Tory party, Penny Mordaunt isn’t the answer. There’s too little there; behind the Brunhilda vibe, there’s no substance, no coherent political philosophy, certainly not a conservative one.
Yet when it comes to the Tory grassroots membership, they’ve got form when it comes to delivering to the nation the worst possible candidate available, and yes, I’m thinking Liz Truss.
The one thing that Mordaunt has got going for her now which she didn’t in the last contest, is her simply splendid performance holding the Sword of State at the Coronation, looking as regal as anything. Her decorative appeal is unmatched, though, this being the Tories, it’s not a terribly high bar.
As Charles Moore, Margaret Thatcher’s biographer, observed: “After Penny Mordaunt’s magnificent performance with the Jewelled Sword, it seems clear that she is the only conceivable challenger for the Tory leadership before the next general election. There is something about a handsome woman on the warpath which excites the fealty of traditional Tory supporters, particularly men.”
Well quite, though he did ungallantly add that she didn’t have to carry the full weight of the sword; it was suspended from a pouch in her collar.
But when it comes to the substance, what’s there? She hasn’t had a stellar ministerial record
But when it comes to the substance, what’s there? She hasn’t had a stellar ministerial record. At Defence, as minister for the Armed Forces, she had the benefit of time as a naval reservist but she wasn’t there long enough to make her mark. “Lightweight” was how one insider remembered her.
While it’s untrue that, as has been alleged, she’s in favour of gender self-identification, whereby any of us can change sex by simply announcing the fact, as minister for women and equalities she presided over a maternity services bill that referred to “pregnant people”. It took the Lords to replace that with “expectant mothers”. In response she declared that “trans men are men, and trans women are women”.
Her programme for the leadership was light on detail, but it’s worth reflecting on her book, co-written with Chris Lewis, called Greater: Britain After the Storm. There’s quite a lot there that Sir Keir Starmer might have written — by which I mean, relatively uncontentious stuff — but it tells you why she’s not much of a conservative.
Quite gratuitously, she had a go at a number of old British films and TV series on the basis that they suggest that “the past was so much better”. She dismisses David Lean’s films Great Expectations and Lawrence of Arabia on this basis, as well as Michael Anderson’s The Dam Busters.
She doesn’t care for David Croft and Jimmy Perry’s “nostalgic focus” in their “churned-out” sitcoms such as Dad’s Army. She describes It Ain’t Half Hot, Mum — their wartime comedy set in India and Burma — as “a full-house bingo card of… casual racism, homophobia, white privilege, colonialism, transphobia, bullying, misogyny and sexual harassment”.
Look, there’s no law saying that you have to like Lawrence of Arabia, but if you’re supposed to be a Tory, it’s a bit much to have this particular catalogue of offences — white privilege? really? — in your lexicon.
None of this is mortally serious. But what it suggests is that she’s not a terribly authentic Tory. She gives the impression instead that she’s a bit like Sir Keir in a willingness to adopt whatever pose, whatever language, happens to be in fashion at the time.
And right now, we’ve got quite a lot of politicians of that kind: light on policy, light on commitment to their party’s traditions, keen to swim firmly in the direction of the present tide. Penny Mordaunt is an ornament to the party, but that’s exactly where she should stay; ornamental.
