The Conservative Party as the standard bearer of centre-right British politics faces “long term extinction” unless it appeals to younger voters, a study has found.
Bright Blue, a London think tank linked to the party’s liberal wing, also warned that “sudden philosophical shifts” under different Tory leaders in recent years had severely damaged its reputation with voters, who now doubted its competence.
Bright Blue, run by former political adviser Ryan Shorthouse, has released a report, The Right Road, on the future of the centre right in Europe, where mainstream politics has been roiled by populist right-wing parties.
It called for a “reboot and reunification” of the centre right to defeat populists and, as described by the authors, the “statist” left.
It laid out principles that the authors argued centre-right parties should rally around. These included “prioritising the defence of civility” in the face of abrasive populist politics, and fostering a greater shared national identity “for people to unite around” in countries grappling with immigration and assimilation.
Tuesday’s launch in London of the report, however, laid bare some of the divisions that persist in the Conservative party over its best way forward amid the threat to its future from populist political forces such as Nigel Farage’s Reform UK.
Researchers, academics and Tory-linked politicians gathered for a panel debate on Tuesday in the grand Council Room of the Institute of Mechanical Engineers building at Birdcage Walk, within sight of the Houses of Parliament at Westminster.
One of the panellists, Nick Timothy, a former co-chief of staff to former Tory prime minister Theresa May, and now a Tory MP himself and party whip, gave an excoriating analysis of the party’s travails.
Mr Timothy said Conservatives had been “seduced” by political liberals who had managed to convince everybody that their ideology was the “natural order of things” when, he said, it wasn’t.
He encouraged his fellow Tories to “embrace the change” wrought on the mainstream system by populists.
For example, Mr Timothy said Britain had been “incredibly naive” in the way it dealt with China. He suggested China’s influence had been “a cancer in the economy”. Chinese exporters, he alleged, were selling equipment to Britain with secret “kill switches” while the British government had treated China “like Sweden” in trade rules.
“They’re not Sweden,” he said.
He also called for a push towards “net negative” immigration.
Meanwhile, his fellow Tory MP, shadow Scottish secretary Andrew Bowie, said he felt Mr Timothy was “too negative”. But he conceded centre-right parties such as the Tories had been “quite lazy” in addressing issues important to voters, such as immigration.
He warned, however, that they needed to make their case “with more hope”, which he said voters craved.
