After Braverman?

 

 

So now we know: Prime-minister  Sunak prefers Suella Braverman’s bile to come from  outside the tent rather than inside.  There will be much speculation abut the likely consequences.  Here’s mine.

On the whole, I think the short-term consequences are likely to be good for the “progressive forces “ (if only we can manage to harness them.)  It is fairly clear that Ms Braverman is trying to position herself as the “go-to” candidate for the Conservative leadership if and when (which she expects) the party is defeated and the present leadership resigns.  In fact some commentators  suspect that she may actually have deliberately engineered her sacking.

Be that as it may, her presence on the back benches is bound to be even more disruptive than if she had remained in the cabinet.  But while burnishing her credentials as the “right” choice for the leadership. and distancing herself as far as possible from the policies of the government in what I hope is its death throes year, she will make the party appear even more disunited.

The conventional wisdom is that voters do not like disunited parties and will therefore be more than ever tempted to look elsewhere. 

If M/s Braverman is successful in her ploy and does become leader of the diminished Tories after the election, that too could be good for the “progressive forces.”   

Again the conventional wisdom is that British voters do not like extremist parties and that both the Conservatives and Labour are more successful when led, respectively, from just right or just left of centre.  That was certainly the experience of Tony Blair’s “New” Labour  and its thirteen years in power, in contrast to Jeremy Corbyn’s bid for power with a more robust left-wing programme (though it wasn’t really, just painted that way by the press.)

However, the “conventional wisdom” may be out of date and the public may be tired of wishy-washy governments with almost indistinguishable policies. 

 Certainly I am, and would like to see a more vigorous Liberal assault from the Liberal Democrats on almost everything  the government does (on housing, the judicial system, education, devolution, the climate crisis, local government, company responsibilities, ownership of the media, taxation  and how we are governed, to mention just some.)

The electorate may take the same view but make the wrong choice - a dash for deregulation and a barricaded “Singapore on Thames."  After the Truss disaster you’d think we’d know better.  But the US has had four years of the awful President Trump and there seems the incredible possibility that they might elect him again.

So Ms Braverman’s gamble could succeed.  We live in very dangerous time.