Ineptitude and institutional wokery is the tragic legacy of Conservative rule

The first task for the new PM must be to answer why – after 12 years in office – a Left-wing agenda continues unabated

There are many thoughts that go through one’s head whenever the Conservative Party engages in the aftermath of its latest round of regicide. As this season’s contenders go back and forth, the ghosts of leaders past float by. But so does a haunting question which lingers in the air. As the candidates discuss tax policy, the economy, the Civil Service, wokeness and much more, the terrible thought arises: “Have you not been in power for more than a decade now?”

This week, we learnt our military – specifically the RAF – has essentially temporarily stopped recruiting white males. That is because men of fighting age are no longer what our military wants. They want “diversity”, like everything else in our time. So the recruiting of white males must stop until enough ethnic minorities are willing to throw themselves into the breach. Or enough women can be wooed away from jobs they might rather do and be persuaded to fight.

Of course, quota systems of this kind should be absolute anathema to any Conservative. They reek of social engineering, are the exact opposite of personal freedom and choice, and betray a country with all of the wrong priorities. The only priority our military should have is to be as much of a deterrent as possible. Yet no foreign enemy or competitor will fear our Army because it is so diverse.

Naturally there was some grumbling from Conservative MPs and others after this recruitment news came out this week. But again we must ask: who has been in charge? The diversity quotas are being defended by the head of the Armed Forces, Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, and the RAF’s Air Chief Marshal, Sir Mike Wigston. You only get into these positions today if you are a highly political operator. You don’t have to be the best soldier or admiral, just willing to mouth that season’s political shibboleths. And what does it say about the Conservative Party that such shibboleths were embedded on their watch? It is the same thought that occurs when ministers and others moan about the Civil Service – its entrenched attitudes and some of its immovable biases. Again the question comes, have you been in power for the last 12 years?

Naturally at this point, a defence may be put forward that for five years between 2010 and 2015 the Conservatives were in charge but had to go at slow-learner speed thanks to the presence in the coalition of the Liberal Democrats. Of course, some sympathy can be extended towards anyone who has had Nick Clegg around their leg for five years. But this sympathy is not endless.

We still had a Conservative prime minister in those days and a majority Tory Cabinet. So why is that, apart from Michael Gove’s school reforms, it is so hard to point to any policy – any – in those five years that could make a Conservative heart sing?

Of course, we all know what followed. The solitary, hubristic year of David Cameron’s victory, the years of May, the disappointment of Boris. There are excuses that can be made at each and every stage for each and every one of these prime ministers. But one thing they all had in common was that they all were, without doubt, Conservative Party prime ministers. For the last seven years, they led Tory majority governments. And some voters may have become increasingly disgruntled at the way in which the contenders for the party leadership still talk about their ideas for Conservative Britain as though it is not a project which has been in their party’s hands all this time.

They were in power. But to what effect? Conservatives are very happy to talk about the outrage of illegal migration at the English Channel, but they are not willing to do anything about it. Such as withdrawing from the jurisdiction of the European court that effectively forbids us from having our own border and being allowed to police it. Remember the occasional eruptions of talk about “A British bill of rights” to replace the European Convention? What happened to it? The same thing as so much else. All talk.

While the Conservatives were in government, almost everything underneath them went in a less conservative direction. Whether it was government borrowing, tax rises, woke-washing through everything or anything else, it is exceptionally hard to point to any area of public life which has not gone the way that the establishment expected. For instance anyone with an eye to the long game could probably see that the Conservatives were never really serious about abolishing “diversity” and replacing it with “excellence”, say, as a goal for Conservative Britain.

All the Civil Service embarrassments of forced indoctrination days have happened under the Conservative Party’s management. All the quota systems and days of lost productivity that come from this system cannot be complained about by the Conservative Party. Because they oversaw it.

So the question at some point must be answered. If a Conservative minister or even prime minister proposes something conservative now they must be asked who exactly has been in charge of the system for the past 12 years? What would they have done differently? And why wasn’t that done? Something will have to be turned around in the next two years. Because otherwise the Conservative Party will have nowhere to hide at the next election. Their epitaph will be that, yes, they were in power for 15 years. And through a huge diversity of ways they wasted it.

All the Civil Service forced indoctrination days have happened under the Tory party’s management