By God, she is brave
In an instant, Theresa May has killed off Thatcherism. It may end in disaster, but...
ON TUESDAY, October 4, 1994, I was standing in Blackpool’s Winter Gardens nursing a mild hangover. Tony Blair was coming to the end of his leader’s speech, and I was loyally – if wearily – applauding his prepared clap lines.
Then I heard him say the following words: ‘This is a modern party living in an age of change. It requires a modern constitution that says what we are in terms the public cannot misunderstand and the Tories cannot misrepresent.’
I raised my eyebrows, and turned to my left. Next to me was a fellow Labour researcher. We looked at each other and gestured ‘did he say what I think I heard him say?’.
He had. Unbeknown to most people in the hall, Blair had just announced the abolition of the part of the Labour constitution committed to wholesale renationalisation. It marked the formal end of the old Labour Party, and opened the door to 13 years of government.
I had just witnessed the famous Clause IV moment.
Thursday’s manifesto launch represented Theresa May’s Clause IV moment. Where Blair had tried sleight of hand, she, characteristically, preferred bluntness.
‘For too many people in Britain today, life is simply much harder than many seem to think or realise. They are not ideological. They don’t buy into grand visions. They aren’t fooled by politicians who promise the earth and claim no tough choices are required.’
In that instant, Thatcherism – and its dogmatic faith in the power of free markets – died. Along with John Major’s sepia tinted vision of Britain, and David Cameron’s liberal, metro-centric Toryism.
To grasp the full significance of what she said you need to understand what she didn’t say. Mrs May could have ignited the blow-torch of a new Conservative revolution. A bonfire of regulation. The slashing of taxes. An acceleration of deficit reduction, coupled with a fresh assault on public services.
Who could have stopped her? The Election is won. The official Opposition are a rabble. Her opponents within her own party are still reel- ing from her turbo-ascent to the premiership. But instead, she lined up the Conservative Party’s holy cows, and slayed them.
The l ock on i ncome tax and national insurance rises. Gone. The triple lock on pensions. Gone. The cap on social care costs for wealthier pensioners. Gone. In the age of the new populism, she had framed herself as the anti-populist.
Anyone in any doubt about the import of the moment was directed to the chapter of the manifesto headlined ‘Our Principles’. It read ‘Conservatism is not and never has been the philosophy described by caricaturists. We do not believe in untrammelled free markets. We reject the cult of selfish individualism. We abhor social division, injustice, unfairness and inequality. We see rigid dogma and ideology not just as needless but dangerous.’
If Conservative strategists aren’t planning to put that on the back of their membership cards – as Blair did with his new Clause IV wording – they should be sacked. Theresa May has rightly been criticised during this campaign. I followed her to an event in Bristol, and I have never seen a prime minister less comfortable in the public arena. Her hands shake. Her voice trembles. Before she begins she does ‘the May pause’, where she has to physically will herself to start speaking.
The strategy of hiding her from voters and the press is born of necessity, not opportunity.
But by God, she is brave. Blair’s Clause IV moment was the product of the electoral need to convince the British people his party really had changed. May was under no such obligation.
She could, as many predicted, have played it safe. Hid behind her ‘strong and stable’ mantra, pledged to deliver a hard-Brexit, and harvested up the votes. NSTEAD, she has opted to throw down the gauntlet to her party and the voters. She has told the former it must recast itself, and the latter they will no longer be infantilised by the political class. Blair had the courage to do both during his premiership. But not in the middle of his first campaign.
May’s attempt to manhandle her party and country into the postBrexit era is also courageous for another reason. Blair’s modernisation project was a journey into the unknown. She embarks on her own expedition with the wreckage of Blairism still smouldering on the horizon.
Allegations of betrayal. Barbs about not being true to your party. A giddying transformation from saviour to pariah. For her, Blairism is not a signpost so much as a warning from history. As one MP said: ‘There’s been a reaction to the manifesto on the doorsteps. We’ll get away with it because our people have already made up their mind to vote for us. But if we mess it up, especially Brexit, their vengeance will be terrible.’
Blair’s attempt to transform his party and country ended in disaster. So could May’s. But for its bravery alone, her Clause IV moment deserves a kinder fate.