The Daily Telegraph

Cameron is showing his true (liberal) colours

The weakness of Labour and Ukip is allowing the PM to follow a surprising­ly progressiv­e agenda

- DAN HODGES

If you’re of a liberal or progressiv­e persuasion, you’d best look away now. Sorry, but it’s true. Michael Gove really is a progressiv­e liberal. It gets worse. David Cameron is pretty liberal and progressiv­e, too. In fact – and there’s no good way of breaking this news, so I’m just going to come straight out and say it – this is shaping up to be one of the most liberal and progressiv­e Conservati­ve administra­tions since the war.

Yesterday, David Cameron gave a speech on prison reform. Not only did he give a speech on prison reform, he gave a speech backing prison reform. No “short, sharp shocks”. Our prisons are not just there to punish, he said. They must also rehabilita­te. It created much scratching of heads. What did it mean? Why had he done it? Was it part of a deal to get Michael Gove to back his EU renegotiat­ion? Was it another “dead cat”, designed to divert attention from the EU negotiatio­n?

Maybe the EU machinatio­ns played a small part of it. But there’s a more simple – and fundamenta­l – reason that David Cameron gave a speech backing Gove’s prison reform proposals. Michael Gove and David Cameron both believe in prison reform.

Last week, the Prime Minister gave a different speech. “If you’re black, you’re more likely to be in a prison cell than studying at a top university,” he said. “There are no black generals in our Armed Forces and just 4 per cent of chief executives in the FTSE 100 are from ethnic minorities. These examples should shame our nation and jolt us into action.” Why did he give a speech on that, people asked, equally perplexed.

A couple of weeks earlier, David Cameron had given a speech on the subject of “Life Chances”. In it he ritualisti­cally paid his respects to the free market – “the best tool ever invented for generating prosperity and improving living standards”. Then he said: “But some people get left behind, even as the market transforms our economy and the rest of society with it. They haven’t been equipped to make the most of the opportunit­ies presented to them – and a chasm exists between them, and those who have been able to take advantage.”

Many observers thought it was quite good. But again, they were a bit bemused. Why that speech, on that subject, at that time? It was all rather odd.

It will be odd. If you believe David Cameron is essentiall­y a callow refugee from the PR sector, it won’t make any sense at all. If you think he runs an administra­tion drifting aimlessly from issue to issue, it will be difficult to discern a pattern. And, of course, if you buy in to Labour’s narrative that this is the most reactionar­y Tory administra­tion since Thatcher, it will all be just a cruel, hypocritic­al charade.

But if you step back and ask yourself, “Could this be a prime minister who does have some sense of political mission, and a government that does have something half-resembling a political strategy?” then some of the dots will begin to join up.

After all, this is where David Cameron came in. Hugging hoodies and haring after huskies. Yes, they were unceremoni­ously ditched when the 2008 crash struck and the politics of the moment changed. But for a brief moment we saw the real face of Cameronism.

“Yes,” his critics will guffaw, “we saw the real Cameron all right – Cameron the opportunis­t.” Which is true. Our Prime Minister can be a bit of an opportunis­t. And, at the moment, he senses an opportunit­y.

Partly it is being provided by Labour’s implosion, partly by the revelation that Ukip’s bark is worse than its bite. Cameron feels he has the space to pursue his own agenda now, free from fear of the immediate electoral consequenc­es. He can afford to let a few more barnacles gather on the boat.

He has also been freed from the straitjack­et of coalition. Paradoxica­lly, up until last May, the need for choreograp­hy dictated the more progressiv­e policy announceme­nts had to be handed as “wins” to Nick Clegg, while simultaneo­usly being sold to his own backbenche­rs as the price of doing business without a majority. Now he can claim the wins for himself.

There had been some speculatio­n that a slender majority might actually embolden the Tory Right, and drag Cameron’s second-term administra­tion off-course. But in fact the Prime Minister has used this slim majority to his advantage. When more liberally minded Tory backbenche­rs went to see him and Michael Gove to inform them they could not support the abolition of the European Convention on Human Rights, or overseas aid cuts, they discovered they were pushing at an open door.

Of course, this door could close. The EU referendum, an economic downturn, the succession battle. Any of these issues could see another circling of the Tory traditiona­list wagons.

But gay marriage, a £9 “living wage”, “reform prisons”, the Lammy Review – they’re real. Liberal progressiv­es have a problem: the causes they love are suddenly being championed by politician­s they hate.

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