Old Socialist on Mr. Colvile’s October 6, 2024 essay.
Oct 13, 2024
In last weeks column Mr. Colvile opined as if he were not a Tory:
The analysis of Sir Keir Starmer’s election victory by Sir Keir Starmer’s personal think tank is not exactly an un-smug document. But perhaps the smuggest section of Labour Together’s election post-mortem comes when the public are asked for the first word that comes to mind when thinking about the Conservatives. The top answers? Liars. Corrupt. Useless. Rich. Rubbish. Incompetent. Bad. Untrustworthy. The report notes that 87 further respondents “used words that were unprintable”.
Editor: Colvile reaches beyond the preceding paragraph in the guise of an ‘objective observer’ , a riff on Adam Smith’s ‘The Impartial Spectator’, D. D. Raphael’s book is the indispensable source:
Following the Conservative Party leadership contest, however, you might well get the impression that such a word cloud would contain only two words: “immigration” and “ECHR”. The question of whether to remain in, reform or reject the European Convention on Human Rights has become the most significant (and rancorous) policy difference between the candidates. And now, like Tennyson’s Kraken rising from the deep, Boris Johnson has pronounced on the issue, arguing that there is “a strong case” for — and this may sound familiar — a referendum.
Personally, I am genuinely undecided on the issue of the ECHR. I am struck by how often friends in the last government, working in the Home Office in particular, came to believe that the terms of our membership — or rather the constant reinterpretation of those terms by the left-wing legal establishment — prevented us from deporting foreign criminals, blocking illegal migration and thwarting dangerous terrorists.
I also take the point that it may be better to have, and settle, the fight as part of the leadership contest than see it gnaw at party unity for years. And that, given the salience of illegal migration to those voters lost to Reform, a firm statement on the ECHR is about the only way to show that you’re actually serious.
But there are also strong arguments on the other side. Promising another European referendum would look, to many voters, like a scraping of the Brexit barrel. In policy terms, the ECHR interacts precariously with the settlement in Northern Ireland. Furthermore, as one senior Tory argues, building up the ECHR as a silver bullet means that you really do need the boats to stop coming once you leave. But there’s no way to guarantee that, given where our own lawyers are. Yes, the European Court of Human Rights blocked the Rwanda plan — but so did British judges, using both British and international law. And politically, no matter how hardline their position, the Conservatives will always be outflanked on migration by Reform.
Editor: Colvile interviews Tom Tugendhat, who was another Conference attendee & and fellow ‘Conservative’. The paragraph ends with noxious Neo-Liberal cliches.
When I interviewed Tom Tugendhat at Conservative Party conference, he argued that Britain was a country built on the rule of law — but that increasingly we are living under the rule of lawyers, which not only results in debacles like the surrender of the Chagos Islands but restricts innovation, entrepreneurship and growth. It is a sentiment that all three of his leadership rivals would share — not least given Starmer’s former profession. On-stage interviews with James Cleverly and Robert Jenrick by me and others were studded with references to a smaller but more effective state, to cutting regulation and letting enterprise bloom.
Editor: In quick succession is Kemi Badenoch, another fellow traveler:
Kemi Badenoch went even further, using the conference to publish a 40-page essay called “Conservatism in Crisis: Rise of the Bureaucratic Class”. It argued that the central division in our society is now between those who are answerable to the market and those answerable to the state. In other words, the growth of government isn’t just about tax and spend — or public sector headcount or state control of industry — but the countless private sector compliance officers and diversity consultants who ultimately dance to the progressive tune.
Editor: There are 503 words left in this essay. I’ll just engage in some self-serving reductionism, of these final paragraphs:
…
But the primal fault was in the laws and lawyers, the rules and regulators. The Tories merely failed to fight hard enough, or argue convincingly enough, against them.
…
Talk to anyone running a business — of any size, in any sector — and they will quickly start ranting about the scale and stupidity of their compliance burdens. You hear the same from many in the public sector.
…
In fact, not only were the roles themselves completely different, but the market for warehouse staff was so tight that the company had to beg its retail workers to move over to fill vacant jobs.
…
As I’ve argued before, voters will definitely not be offering more polite alternatives to the eight words at the top of this article if it seems as if the Tories are picking fights with Brussels or the “wokerati” purely for the sake of it.
“The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers” works in Shakespeare. It may work equally well in government. But first the Tories need to get back there.
Old Socialist
StephenKMackSD's Blog 