If in doubt about a political question, always consult the collected works of Monty Python. There is no higher authority. What, for example, is the future of the Conservative Party?
The key text in this case is the classic 1970 “Election Night Special” sketch, in which the Silly Party puts forward candidates such as Jethro Q Walrustitty and Tarquin Fin-tim-lin-bin-whin-bim-lim-bus-stop-F’tang-F’tang-Olé-Biscuitbarrel. They are opposed by the Slightly Silly Party, and its prospective MPs such as Kevin Phillips-Bong.
Yesterday, the 2023 Tory counterpart of the Silly Party launched itself formally as the “New Conservatives”: more than 25 MPs, elected in 2017 and 2019, many representing the “Red Wall” seats captured from Labour four years ago.
Their opening salvo was a 12-point plan to cut immigration by 400,000. It was striking to hear a rising star such as Miriam Cates, the ultra-traditionalist MP for Penistone and Stocksbridge, spell out what the group considers to be at stake. The Government, she said, could keep its manifesto promises on immigration; or “kick the can down the road, [and] lose the next election”.
Though the New Conservatives are very keen to hold on to their own seats, the mere fact of their existence shows that they have more or less given up on Rishi Sunak. Note, for instance, the senior role in the caucus played by Lee Anderson, the deputy Conservative chairman, whose primary role is supposed to be to secure electoral victory for the Prime Minister.
He was absent from yesterday’s launch — leant upon by No 10, some speculated. But the fact that he is involved at all in the New Conservative faction shows how much faith he really has in the PM’s chances.
It is noticeable, too, how many media commentators are pronouncing the Sunak Project a comprehensive failure. Tory MPs cannot be quite so brazen. But all this factionalism is primarily political positioning for life after the election.
What is certain is that the post-Sunak Conservative Party will not embrace a return to the old One Nation centre-ground. There are simply no significant champions of this tradition left: they were all purged by Boris Johnson in 2019. They have ceased to be.
No: the ideological battle will be between varieties of Brexitism, of Right-wing populism. The Silly Party — sorry, the New Conservatives — will demand an even tougher approach to immigration.
In this respect, crucially, they reveal that they prioritise nationalist identity — or what they call “cultural security” — over the needs of the economy. With 165,000 vacancies in the care home sector, it is madness to propose the closure of the scheme to allow care homes to recruit foreign workers.
With the UK tech and financial sectors in need of the best and the brightest, it is madness to suggest ending the graduate visa route, which allows foreign students to remain in the UK for up to two years while they look for a job after finishing their courses.
Yet this is precisely what the New Conservatives propose. They are culture warriors before they are champions of economic growth. And their flame-eyed rhetoric is giving some of their Brexiteer allies pause for thought.
Note, for instance, that Steve Baker, the Northern Ireland minister, and former “Spartan” hardliner in the Brexit legislative wars, has distanced himself from the Home Secretary, Suella Braverman — whose leadership campaign he backed last year. Reportedly, Baker now feels that Braverman has “heaped shame upon innocent men” by claiming in April (quite inaccurately) that grooming gangs are “almost all British-Pakistani”.
Witness, too, the decision by Business and Trade Secretary Kemi Badenoch not to ditch all EU laws in one mighty bonfire by the end of the year. This would have involved the review of 4,000 pieces of legislation by December 31, and she has opted instead for a phased strategy. This has put her at odds with some fellow Brexiteers — to whom her riposte has been: “I’m certainly not an arsonist. I’m a Conservative”.
In the strategic positions adopted by Baker and Badenoch we witness the emergence of the Slightly Silly Party: still fiercely committed to Brexit and the reduction of immigration, but at least a little mindful of the impact of dog-whistle rhetoric and measures directly hostile to economic recovery.
Silly or Slightly Silly: what a choice. How can you resist?
Matthew d’Ancona is a columnist
