The prospect of the Tamworth by-election, in which a safe Conservative seat may fall to the Labour party, has prompted a few thoughts about the next important election but one. After the general election will follow the contest to be the next leader of the Tory party.
In December 1834 Sir Robert Peel issued a political statement to the electors of his constituency which has become known as “The Tamworth Manifesto”. As the voters of Tamworth go to the polls in one of two by-elections – Nadine Dorries’s vacated seat of Mid-Bedfordshire is the other – it is remarkable how far the Tory party have come from the spirit of Peel’s Tamworth, the spirit that is the secret of their success as an electoral force and a governing party.
The purpose of the Tamworth Manifesto was to persuade the Conservative party to stop colliding with reality. In November 1834 King William IV had removed the Prime Minister Lord Melbourne and asked the Duke of Wellington to replace him. Wellington declined and recommended Peel who then felt the need to distinguish himself from both Melbourne and Wellington. The Tamworth Manifesto was the document in which he did that. This was the moment at which the Conservative party began to come to terms with the passage of the 1832 Reform Act. Peel gave up on Wellington’s die-in-a-ditch opposition and defined conservatism as a doctrine which accepts today as the status quo something that yesterday it rejected as change. While conservatives should, said Peel, oppose “a perpetual vortex of agitation” they should always “reform to survive”.
It is rare for the Conservative party to forget these principles entirely but this is one of those moments. Though it is still possible – even likely – that the Tories hold on in Tamworth (their vote could halve and they would still win), there is little to cheer the party. The conference season – seasoned with disobliging by-elections – has offered nothing for the Conservative party beyond the prospect of an electoral defeat. And so we might as well start speculating what would follow defeat which would be a leadership election. The Conservative party conference in Manchester was really an early audition for the job of leader of the opposition. So let’s start taking them seriously and assess the candidates.
Peel’s survivalist reformism aside, there isn’t much by way of historical example to work with. The Conservative party doesn’t suffer all that many defeats so there isn’t much of a pattern to its reaction. For the most part, though, it tends not to lurch straight into the wilderness. Turning to William Hague in 1997 was never likely to work – Blair had a majority of 179 after all – and it was far too early for Hague to take up the job, but he was, at least, a talented politician and it was worth a try. The real error followed later because Iain Duncan Smith wasn’t good enough to lead the party. Duncan Smith’s tenure was so ineffective that he failed even to fight an election. Michael Howard became caretaker manager and ran a defensive – not to say unpleasant – campaign in 2005 that cut the Labour majority by more than half.
In 1974 Ted Heath lost two elections to Labour and was soon replaced by the then unlikely figure of Margaret Thatcher. An inexperienced politician, the first woman leader of a major political party in a time less enlightened even than now, Thatcher took time to grow. Alec Douglas-Home stayed on briefly after the 1964 defeat to Harold Wilson but he was replaced a year later by Heath. Ted Heath himself survived election defeats in 1966 and two more in 1974 but almost nobody can carry on after a loss these days, unless it is a loss that the party manages to pretend is a victory, like Jeremy Corbyn in 2017.
This accelerated pace of modern politics means we can give short shrift to one sensible option, which is that Rishi Sunak stays on. It is possible, if the election is tight and promises a repeat, that the Tory party might summon the discipline to allow Sunak – who would have performed better than expected – to have another shot. But none of the assumptions in that argument are highly plausible. We can probably dispense quickly with the other more sensible options. If he thought he had even the remotest prospect of winning, Jeremy Hunt could be prevailed upon to take on the leadership and usher the party through a dangerous moment. Sadly, he has no chance. The senior statesman of the party is Michael Gove but it is likely the party will want to move on. Gove might turn out to be the Michael Howard, the emergency service to whom the party turns after a couple of abortive leaderships. A party that understood it doesn’t have a potential Prime Minister among the younger crop of cabinet ministers might even ask Theresa May to come out of retirement to be the caretaker manager. But all of this is hopeless whimsy.
The Tory party will instead turn to one of the candidates who isn’t really good enough. A warning to people of a sensitive conservative disposition. None of the candidates below will beat Keir Stamer in a general election unless something has gone terribly awry for the Labour government. There is a very strong chance that, after the defeat that is coming soon, the Tory party will condemn itself to a second defeat by selecting a terrible leader.
The leading candidates are Kemi Badenoch, Suella Braverman and Penny Mordaunt. The trouble with all three – apart from not being very good – is that they will all be competing in narrow terms within the party. The old Cameron gang probably won’t have a dog in the race. Clare Coutinho might be their candidate but it is much too soon for her, even if there ever comes a time when she is ready.
Anyone on the residual left of the party will probably be casting around for someone else to vote for and might, if that were the field, settle for Penny Mordaunt, which is why she might be a good bet. Badenoch and Braverman will battle it out to be the turn-back-the-clock culture warrior that the party appears to crave. It is possible that there is enough of an appetite for that kind of howl of anguish that both of them can make it through to the vote of the party membership. But if one of the two is more likely to emerge than the other it will be Badenoch for the simple reason that she is better than Braverman. Suella Braverman, as well as being intellectually egregious, is also not remotely up to the job of leader of the opposition, which is the most difficult in British politics.
There will be other candidates, because there always are. Any number of people could announce that they are taking soundings and briefly declare themselves to be prospects. Watch out for Brandon Lewis, Grant Shapps, Oliver Dowden and Tom Tugendhat. Maybe there will be candidates whose chutzpah at entering the contest shocks everyone except themselves. Liz Truss, Dominic Raab, Danny Kruger, Mark Harper take a brief bow.
If the Braverman versus Badenoch fight proves only that neither option is a good one, there are two outside bets who could come through. Gillian Keegan is popular and could become the sort of candidate who is nobody’s first choice but everybody’s second. Perhaps more likely, the Foreign Secretary James Cleverly has managed to stay relatively unaligned within the party. He will now, sadly, have his moment in the spotlight and he could easily emerge as the candidate whose chief virtue is that he is neither Suella nor Kemi.
There is one candidate not yet mentioned. Nigel Farage has decided that, by 2026, he will be the leader of the Conservative party. As if he is not an MP, and has no current plans to become one, either Mr Farage has finally jumped the shark or he does have plans to stand for Parliament. If he cannot jump into a safe seat before the election which is due by January 2025, then Mr Farage will have to find a by-election. Maybe Tamworth will come up again and he will stand and win it handsomely. Or maybe Mr Farage is talking rot.
It is a sign, though, of where the Conservative party is heading that Mr Farage should muse like this in public. The answer after the election might not be as bad as Nigel Farage but it is not likely to be good. This is a party that is ready for the fight, with itself. This is a party set on losing, a party that cannot wait to enter Peel’s “perpetual vortex of agitation”.