The Sad Death of the Centre-Right

And a possible rebirth?

The Queen’s Speech earlier in the month was remarkable only for its lack of content. A Government with a substantial majority; sweeping executive powers; and most of the national press onside, produced a list of 38 bills that created barely a murmur. They are a mix of technocratic tweaks, minor gimmicks, and culture war noise. There's nothing that's remotely up to dealing with the huge challenges the country faces – whether around economic productivity, poverty, housing, public service improvement, climate change, or anything else.

This is not an opinion confined to natural opponents of the Tories. Robert Colvile, who co-wrote the Government’s manifesto, asked in the Sunday Times: “apart from Brexit, what else will the Tories have to show for their 80 seat majority?” Sam Ashworth-Hayes, a conservative commentator, found himself voting Labour in the local elections because:

“The Conservative vision for Britain is a care home with an army attached, and given current trends I wouldn’t bet on the second part standing 20 years from now. They offer nothing for young people…. Stuck between a Labour party that despises me and a Conservative party that actively wants to drain me of my money, I’ll vote for the former until a third way becomes viable.”

There are some prosaic reasons for the Government being in this mess. They’ve been in power for 12 years and all administrations run out of energy eventually. Boris Johnson is a good campaigner but a terrible Prime Minister with little interest in policy and chronically indecisive in the way only a true narcissist can be. By trying to agree with everyone he’s ended up in a place where the Government’s primary political narrative – levelling up economically disadvantaged parts of the country – is in total contradiction to their primary economic narrative of cutting tax. Which means they’re doing neither.

But the malaise goes deeper than personalities or weariness. A large part of the problem is a lack of intellectual firepower.