Silent majority has a champion at last
MOST politicians, it is safe to say, take themselves painfully seriously and come across as other-worldly when required to handle a pint in a pub or a bacon sandwich.
These little insights into their character matter. Politicians, after all, are representatives of the people. They are supposed to share our everyday hopes and fears or at least to pretend to.
We like them to look confident and authentic, to appear natural and normal. American political scientists talk of the ‘beer test’. Which candidate, they ask voters, would you rather have a beer with?
Perhaps that goes a long way to explaining the remarkable success of Ruth Davidson in the Holyrood election.
Her appeal is grounded in a sense of genuineness, of authenticity, that few politicians at either Holyrood or Westminster can match.
The product of a Fife comprehensive school, she did not even join the Conservative Party until 2009. She is a member of the Church of Scotland, a lesbian, a kickboxer and a football fan. Not surprisingly, therefore, she comes across less like an identikit politician and more like an ordinary human being.
She seems genuinely to enjoy being on the campaign trail. She appears unworried by the prospect of making a fool of herself; and for precisely that reason, even when she was pictured riding that buffalo, she looks anything but a fool.
But as the recent campaign proved, there is substance beneath the bonhomie. Miss Davidson campaigned vigorously on traditional Conservative principles – even if the word ‘Conservative’ was downplayed, though not entirely excised.
She promised voters she would fight for small businesses, warning that uncompetitive taxes were in danger of driving employers out of the country, threatening jobs. She is tough on law and order, robust on national security and unswerving in her scorn for the deceptions of the separatists.
What Miss Davidson represents, therefore, is a time-honoured, red-blooded Tory message, embodied by a leader who enjoys life, understands ordinary voters and is herself a walking testament to the power of ambition and hard work.