It's time to end the Tory party and Reform and Lib Dems can split the spoils - Mark Oaten
Rishi Sunak
PA
Mark Oaten is a former Lib Dem MP
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Despite its unpredictable nature there is something rather predictable about the pendulum of British politics that swings between the two big parties. Since 1979 the story goes like this, one party rules for 15 years as the other collapses and rebuilds.
We are now weeks away from the next chapter and it’s the turn of the Conservatives to enter the wilderness years. This last happened in 1997 and was followed by a series of failed leaders from Michael Howard, William Hague to Iain Duncan Smith as they struggled to drag the party into the 21-century against a backdrop of cool Britannia and Blair.
Eventually they skipped a generation to find a winning formula with David Cameron and, even then, needed the help of the Lib Dems to get them into power. But this time round could be much much worse than previous defeats. We are in record breaking territory. If the Tories poll less that 29% it will be their worst showing since 1832!
The fallout will be brutal and depending how bad the final results are there is no guarantee the party will survive in its current form. Let’s play out a nightmare scenario. Rishi will immediately step down and then the party will have to decide how it wants to rebuild. A wise party might consider a caretaker to stay in post for a year and undertake a complete top to bottom review of the party.
But there will be hot not wise heads- and most likely not many heads left, with under 200 MPs having to pick a leader before party members have the final say. Worse still it’s still not clear if potential leadership candidates like moderates Penny Mordaunt or Jeremy Hunt will even make the ballot if they fail to hold their seats.
And if all that was not bad enough, this time they will have to deal with the Farage factor. If Reform poll anything like 20% (and I don’t rule that out) it could be a game changer. It would be a crossover moment for the right. The rise of a new party and the steady end of the Conservatives.
Under Farage Reform could grow into the new people’s opposition leaving the official Conservative opposition in Westminster looking irrelevant as they chop and change leader struggling to find a popular direction.
At this point Tory MPs seeing the writing on the wall might easily defect to Reform giving it a first real footing in Parliament.
At last, the long running battle between left and right the party would be over. The right will win under the Reform banner and leaving a small rump of moderate Conservatives left to battle on or join the Lib Dems.
Whatever the outcome the pendulum looks set to swing slowly again. It’s going to take a decade or more before Reform or New Conservatives take power again.
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