Considering the bloodcurdling things that an incoming Conservative government is likely to have to do to revive the economy, this will be no time for an insecure commitment between government and country: the people will need to be positively happy to have got you if they are to put up with what you may have to do to them. (One former minister told me how essential it was to have clear objectives: "You have about six weeks to make your radical moves. Then the department congeals around you.")
There are a good many Conservative MPs who are deeply worried about the relatively small amount of attention that appears to be being devoted to option b). They divide basically into two categories. There are those who feel that the policies that exist are themselves either faint-hearted or wrong-headed, and others who believe that Mr Cameron has basically sound principles but is inexplicably committed to concealing them. Both groups are concerned by the failure to grasp the opportunity to offer positive reforms of government spending and public services. They are desperately concerned that the brave talk about welfare reform which had been progressing nicely under Chris Grayling has now virtually disappeared under the new Welfare and Pensions spokesman Theresa May. One very senior backbencher I spoke to was furious about this: putting Theresa in charge of it was virtually a signal that the whole venture was being dropped. Why not give the job to Nick Herbert, he said, who would have an energetic approach to change? (Mr Herbert, who co-founded the campaigning Reform think tank, is currently farmed out – forgive the pun – to a shadow job in Food and Rural Affairs.)
Read Full Article »