Interesting and valid points. Both yourself and Peter Hitchens have pointed out that the whole "fwee twade", deregulated markets schtick really isn't conservatism, at least in any classic Burkean mould. It's neoliberalism. Libertarianism. Thatcher took this from Sir Keith Joseph who in turn took this from Milton Friedman ("The Road to Serfdom" IIRC). And it was very much the moral case that won them over: 1970s Labour govts had implemented marginal tax rates in excess of 90% since Denis Healey had to go cap in hand to the IMF. There is a moral case to be made that that's not taxation, it's extortion. The Labour govt had effectively become a protection racket. There were knock-on effects too. The 1986 "big bang" saw former east-end barrow-boys becoming shit-hot traders on the foreign exchanges. Turns out that the hustle in Billingsgate is better training for that line than any laughably conformist concensus sterile MBA from LSE. The tories had broken the old-boy old-school-tie-network dominance in highly-remunerated city careers, and that too was a massive moral victory. Railing against classism and inequality was supposed to be Labour's raison d'être. The tories had succesfully pulled the rug out from under Labour's feet. Why the hell aren't the tories proudly crowing about such monumental achievements to this day?
Because it all fell apart around 1991 when Major's leadership lost that moral edge. Those around at the time will remember the persistent sleaze headlines: Harvey Proctor. Steven Milligan. David Mellor. Jeffrey Archer. Johnathan Aitken. The party had lost its intellectual edge too: Major's attempt to correct this was the feeble and rightly-lampooned "Back to Basics" campaign. Coupled with the ever-deepening split over Europe, it's where the rot set in for the tories and they've been dysfunctional ever since.
It's always been like this. If conservatives had had the moral strength to oppose sending infants up chimneys, there mightn't even be a labour party today. And maybe Karl Marx wouldn't be buried in Highgate cemetery.
The tories have a golden opportunity to reinvent themselves. Sure, they need to prostrate themselves and grovel relentlessly for their recent imbecilic form, particularly regarding immigration levels. They also need a putsch of the wets much like Thatcher had to do. History does seems to be repeating itself somewhat.
Ah - you're absolutely right. My memory's getting well dodgy these days. Probably spending too much time having a good long hard think about Edwina Currie.
I can't in all good faith criticise him for that. I'd have done the same. She had that look about her.. I reckon she'd be *proper filthy* in the fart-sack.
And if by some long-shot Edwina Currie happens to read this, and is looking for a modestly-endowed enthusiastic toy-boy, game on 😜
I watched Badenoch a few days ago being interviewed by Charles Moore for the Policy Exchange.
From how she spoke, there's the potential for a serious change in direction, fleshed out policy proposals to run a radical returning small state government.
My big, and remaining criticism is that if the civil service was able to stymie things for the whole 14 years of Cameron to Sunak, what's to stop them again derailing a potentially radical Tory govt?
She is either never asked this, or wouldn't have an answer.
Of course this applies to a Reform govt, a 100x worse.
Better to live in hope and all that. Possibly there are some serious Tories left, but they will still be in competition with the LibDems for the fourth slot unless they up their game. They need to prostrate themselves for their failings, and remove a few wets and other keys players in the old regime, especially the pro-death liberals (why else be conservative?) Bringing in Rupert Lowe in a top role and promoting Kruger, Lam, and Timothy would sort things out quickly. A bold, brash party with a moral mission could be in the game and give Reform a run for its money. In the meantime, the competition is quite healthy, without Reform we would not even be having this discussion.
She’s a dud. She’s a learner swimmer afraid to go into the deep end. The Tory brand was badly damaged by Johnson’s immigration experiment and then his behaviour and management of No10 in lockdown and then Truss’s terrible execution of what I thought a good idea. Badenoch doesn’t have the intelligence nor personality to repair the brand. Good people in the Conservative Party like Danny Kruger, Katie Lam, Nick Timothy, Jack Rankin, Jenrick and Suella need to decide whether they leave the Liberals and join Reform.
Reform can only talk about how strong their polling numbers are but nothing of substance. When their MPs ask questions in the House they're often trivial and comedic rather than serious. The only policy announcement of late from them is a barely comprehensible tax deal were you pay £250,000 and you get a massive discount. So there's no moral core or mission there, just banging their big drum about their polling numbers.
Meanwhile are we seeing a Conservative moral mission? Jenrick and the fare dodgers, Danny Kruger and assisted suicide and Chris Philp and the uber eats scandal...these are framed by the Conservatives as moral issues, that laws are flouted routinely and the authorities do nothing. They highlight the breakdown of the social contract. These kind of exposes the Tories are doing at the moment are things Reform should be doing but don't as it's far too practical and hard work for them...so they revert to talking about how brilliant they are.
The sad thing is that for all the hard yards the proper, dry Conservatives are doing in parliament it doesn't matter with the voters. The lazy, wilfully moronic Reform party are still riding high in the polls.
No group of voters sizeable enough to matter will ever turn to the Tory party for moral leadership again. That ship has sailed, run itself onto a reef, and foundered with all hands. I think you underestimate how despised they are.
Reform are a joke, Homeland is filled with cranks, Heritage are away with the faeries and goodness knows what the state of play is with all the other supposedly right wing start up parties.
I see some shoots of recovery with the Conservatives. Jenrick, Kruger, Philip, Timothy, Lam to name a few are steering the party back...slowly...to where it should be. They need to keep going on that path and hope that the wets don't stage a counter-revolution to derail them. 2029 is still 4 years away.
"...If the Tories can find a sense of moral purpose, with a clear moral framework, there is a path back to power. .."
This is the hard part but do-able in my view.
Whilst the Tories wets were naturally woke - it's not apparent that wokism has many Tory supporters now - Maybe except Rory Stewart.
I suspect the Tories strongest secret weapon is in plain sight - it's the good 'ol labour/semi socialist party - which hasn't yet had a year on office but is failing in so many dimensions. I don't think people are fooled by Starmer, Hermer , Rayner or Reeves. Lots of external events will help blow Labour off course.
The big IF - if the Tories can find/develop that moral framework - a lot of things fall into place - disenchanted Tories ( there are millions of them) will likely desert Reform - but they need a broad church of Toryism to bring them back into the fold - aided and abbeted by the chinless wonders of the current government.
"Credibility" "Seriousness" Nah. Normal people don't give two shits about SW1 wonkbrained nonsense like policy platforms. If Reform hanged nonces and got the trains running on time half the electorate would root for them.
I always thought The Reform Party should be renamed the reform party.
First, they're not a political Party in any meaningful sense, purely a lightning rod/grievance vehicle/PR vehicle for Farage.
Secondly, they really are a pure party, literally having a great time coming up w "policy" japes, being loud and noisy, inviting everyone off the street on the promise of a good time.
But a serious Party, they are not.
Yet you'd put your money on them right now to break thru in 2029.
They don’t have a manifesto but Pete is lying to suggest they have no policies. They have their “Contract with the People” from 2024 which is being updated continually. That’s more than the Tories or Labour have!
Don’t you think aspirations like cutting tax, cutting benefits, slashing immigration, remigration of criminals and illegals, getting shot of net zero, cheaper energy for business and consumers, increasing defence spending and more around housing, a proper Brexit and importantly rowing back on the Blair constitutional changes isn’t an important start?
I agree the devil is in the detail and the “how to” is still to be worked out. But for your average Joe voter, big picture is enough. For people like you who will give confidence to voters I agree detail of “how to” is necessary. But we’re a long way out from an election and there’s time for that. What’s important is aspiration in my humble opinion.
And finally if you don’t want more of Labour there’s no other potential winner as the Tory brand is far too damaged and Badenoch not skilled enough to repair it.
It's a question of credibility. I do not believe even for a nanosecond that Reform is capable of forming a functioning government. The raw material simply isn't there, and they don't have a clue between them. They wouldn't have the first idea how to get anything back on track and have given us no indication how they would go about doing any of it. I think they will crash and burn inside a year. It will be Boris 2.0
Policy needs time to be developed properly, so Reform need to get on with it if they are to have a range of credible, wargamed policies in time for 2028/9.
Aspirations are meaningless soundbites. Yes, one of their aspirations is, as you say, cutting benefits. Their latest Marquis of Granby think tank policy? Abolishing the two-child limit on Universal Credit. So the opposite of their aspiration. They're all over the place. Think I'll let my membership lapse when it's up for renewal!
Thatcher's quote "If you just set out to be liked, you will be prepared to compromise on anything at anytime, and would achieve nothing".is the key point you make.
I've said for many years now that the trouble is if you get two people side by side on their soapboxes one advocating deporting illegal immigrants and the other saying we owe them our understanding and support the latter always wins the day because it is kinder and more compassionate.
There is an old saying long forgotten and ignored by weak cosmetic politicians, and applicable to bringing up children but also governance in general, that you often need to be "cruel to be kind".
All those people on here can mock Farage and Reform all they want and accuse them of lacking policies but they’re way ahead in the polls which was shown to be real on 1st May. Reform’s ideas on the economy are as valid as anyone’s moreso than Reeves’ and I have no idea what the Tories stand for anymore. But all of this is trumped by one obvious fact. Voters hate the Tories for 14 years of wasted time and Johnson’s big immigration experiment. Kemi can exhort the ghost of Maggie all she wants but she won’t win the next election and probably not the one after. Like it or not Reform will win the next election and Farage will become PM. Wouldn’t sensible people prefer that to this Labour shitshow?
It's interesting to see how your ideas and Carl Benjamin's are almost in sync. I've just watched his latest video on his Sargon of Akkad channel called 'On The Coming Civil War' - not that he agrees with the term; similar to you, who I think described it as a series of ongoing low level conflicts between various enclaves, etc.
But both of your points are similarly based around the moral aspects. In his video, that the UK establishment had to make a choice between serving two masters - the British Public that it is meant to serve; or some abstract moral doctrine based around internationalism. And chose the latter.
I hadn't heard of Jenrick hunting fare dodgers, so looked it up on Youtube. Funny to see Femi the Doughnut on the results page with his spicy take about 'corrupt MP' harassing perfectly law-abiding knife-brandishing fare-dodgers! Ha ha. That's wild!!
"Everyone who has looked closely at Reform knows it is a profoundly unserious party" 💯 The Reform leadership is like the Wizard of Oz - performance with no substance. There is nothing behind the curtain.
If Jenrick were leader of the Conservative Party and they show they are serious about having a moral and philosophical framework, underpinning it with serious research and policy - including constitutional reform, otherwise the Blob will suffocate them at birth (ask Liz Truss) - I would vote for them again, in the absence of anything else. I would not vote for a party led by Badenoch - she hasn't got what it takes.
We need an economic policy mirroring Singapore's; full strength armed forces with the navy tasked to repel the invading dinghies; a repeal of the HRA 1998; deport, deport, deport; drill baby drill; nuclear power - SMRs; and DOGE on steroids.
Jenrick is already talking about the One Nations needing to leave the party if they're stirring the pot already/won't get on board with a policy to leave the ECHR.
A good piece of writing but you badly underestimate how much the electorate has changed.
Blair mastered the art of promising the earth and telling people what they want to hear, ever since then we've all known that 'the truth' is unelectable. Farage is doing well precisely because he's a 'right wing' candidate who knows the game he has to play with the 'angry' voter.
My suspicion is that we'll have to exhaust 10 years of Starmer, then a term of what comes next (Farage won't be that person, agreed) before we consign 'confetti politics' to the dustbin of history.
Too many people are not grounded in reality and still want to be 'wooed' in some way, sad but true...
Interesting and valid points. Both yourself and Peter Hitchens have pointed out that the whole "fwee twade", deregulated markets schtick really isn't conservatism, at least in any classic Burkean mould. It's neoliberalism. Libertarianism. Thatcher took this from Sir Keith Joseph who in turn took this from Milton Friedman ("The Road to Serfdom" IIRC). And it was very much the moral case that won them over: 1970s Labour govts had implemented marginal tax rates in excess of 90% since Denis Healey had to go cap in hand to the IMF. There is a moral case to be made that that's not taxation, it's extortion. The Labour govt had effectively become a protection racket. There were knock-on effects too. The 1986 "big bang" saw former east-end barrow-boys becoming shit-hot traders on the foreign exchanges. Turns out that the hustle in Billingsgate is better training for that line than any laughably conformist concensus sterile MBA from LSE. The tories had broken the old-boy old-school-tie-network dominance in highly-remunerated city careers, and that too was a massive moral victory. Railing against classism and inequality was supposed to be Labour's raison d'être. The tories had succesfully pulled the rug out from under Labour's feet. Why the hell aren't the tories proudly crowing about such monumental achievements to this day?
Because it all fell apart around 1991 when Major's leadership lost that moral edge. Those around at the time will remember the persistent sleaze headlines: Harvey Proctor. Steven Milligan. David Mellor. Jeffrey Archer. Johnathan Aitken. The party had lost its intellectual edge too: Major's attempt to correct this was the feeble and rightly-lampooned "Back to Basics" campaign. Coupled with the ever-deepening split over Europe, it's where the rot set in for the tories and they've been dysfunctional ever since.
It's always been like this. If conservatives had had the moral strength to oppose sending infants up chimneys, there mightn't even be a labour party today. And maybe Karl Marx wouldn't be buried in Highgate cemetery.
The tories have a golden opportunity to reinvent themselves. Sure, they need to prostrate themselves and grovel relentlessly for their recent imbecilic form, particularly regarding immigration levels. They also need a putsch of the wets much like Thatcher had to do. History does seems to be repeating itself somewhat.
'who in turn took this from Milton Friedman ("The Road to Serfdom" IIRC)'
Actually it was Friedrich Hayek. It is well worth reading. Keith Joseph was also much impressed by Hayek's Constitution of Liberty.
Milton Friedman was of course the great exponent of Monetarism. He also had an influence.
Ah - you're absolutely right. My memory's getting well dodgy these days. Probably spending too much time having a good long hard think about Edwina Currie.
John Major lost the moral edge when he bedded Edwina Curry!!
I can't in all good faith criticise him for that. I'd have done the same. She had that look about her.. I reckon she'd be *proper filthy* in the fart-sack.
And if by some long-shot Edwina Currie happens to read this, and is looking for a modestly-endowed enthusiastic toy-boy, game on 😜
She had sauce...Currie sauce. Thank you, I'm here all week.
Mmmm. Perfect for devilled eggs
You're a naughty one but I feel the same way about Georgia Meloni, who is also sauce.
I watched Badenoch a few days ago being interviewed by Charles Moore for the Policy Exchange.
From how she spoke, there's the potential for a serious change in direction, fleshed out policy proposals to run a radical returning small state government.
My big, and remaining criticism is that if the civil service was able to stymie things for the whole 14 years of Cameron to Sunak, what's to stop them again derailing a potentially radical Tory govt?
She is either never asked this, or wouldn't have an answer.
Of course this applies to a Reform govt, a 100x worse.
Better to live in hope and all that. Possibly there are some serious Tories left, but they will still be in competition with the LibDems for the fourth slot unless they up their game. They need to prostrate themselves for their failings, and remove a few wets and other keys players in the old regime, especially the pro-death liberals (why else be conservative?) Bringing in Rupert Lowe in a top role and promoting Kruger, Lam, and Timothy would sort things out quickly. A bold, brash party with a moral mission could be in the game and give Reform a run for its money. In the meantime, the competition is quite healthy, without Reform we would not even be having this discussion.
Didn't Badenoch proudly announce there would be no reshuffles until the GE?
Don't forget about bringing in Neil O'Brien as well.
She would say that. Now a chance to show what she is made of. Either she is a clever political operator or a complete dud.
Good question. I think I know the answer.
Go on.
She’s a dud. She’s a learner swimmer afraid to go into the deep end. The Tory brand was badly damaged by Johnson’s immigration experiment and then his behaviour and management of No10 in lockdown and then Truss’s terrible execution of what I thought a good idea. Badenoch doesn’t have the intelligence nor personality to repair the brand. Good people in the Conservative Party like Danny Kruger, Katie Lam, Nick Timothy, Jack Rankin, Jenrick and Suella need to decide whether they leave the Liberals and join Reform.
We'll find out at conference this year.
Reform can only talk about how strong their polling numbers are but nothing of substance. When their MPs ask questions in the House they're often trivial and comedic rather than serious. The only policy announcement of late from them is a barely comprehensible tax deal were you pay £250,000 and you get a massive discount. So there's no moral core or mission there, just banging their big drum about their polling numbers.
Meanwhile are we seeing a Conservative moral mission? Jenrick and the fare dodgers, Danny Kruger and assisted suicide and Chris Philp and the uber eats scandal...these are framed by the Conservatives as moral issues, that laws are flouted routinely and the authorities do nothing. They highlight the breakdown of the social contract. These kind of exposes the Tories are doing at the moment are things Reform should be doing but don't as it's far too practical and hard work for them...so they revert to talking about how brilliant they are.
The sad thing is that for all the hard yards the proper, dry Conservatives are doing in parliament it doesn't matter with the voters. The lazy, wilfully moronic Reform party are still riding high in the polls.
There is zero risk for Reform in any "policy" announcement.
They could literally say they'd end income tax and boost NHS funding, and would get a boost in the polls.
Down to one thing and one thing alone
...Farage/Reform not in power 2010-2024.
They get an indestructible bye from this fact alone.
If they won in 2029 and left office in 2030 setting off a Truss 2.0 bomb at their first Tice budget, we would never hear from Farage again.
Leaving the Tories (I hope under Katie Lam as PM) to pick up the pieces after the snap GE of late 2029/early 2030.
No group of voters sizeable enough to matter will ever turn to the Tory party for moral leadership again. That ship has sailed, run itself onto a reef, and foundered with all hands. I think you underestimate how despised they are.
Reform are a joke, Homeland is filled with cranks, Heritage are away with the faeries and goodness knows what the state of play is with all the other supposedly right wing start up parties.
I see some shoots of recovery with the Conservatives. Jenrick, Kruger, Philip, Timothy, Lam to name a few are steering the party back...slowly...to where it should be. They need to keep going on that path and hope that the wets don't stage a counter-revolution to derail them. 2029 is still 4 years away.
I hear you but I believe they can still become a realistic alternative as of course Thatcher proved after Heath.
"...If the Tories can find a sense of moral purpose, with a clear moral framework, there is a path back to power. .."
This is the hard part but do-able in my view.
Whilst the Tories wets were naturally woke - it's not apparent that wokism has many Tory supporters now - Maybe except Rory Stewart.
I suspect the Tories strongest secret weapon is in plain sight - it's the good 'ol labour/semi socialist party - which hasn't yet had a year on office but is failing in so many dimensions. I don't think people are fooled by Starmer, Hermer , Rayner or Reeves. Lots of external events will help blow Labour off course.
The big IF - if the Tories can find/develop that moral framework - a lot of things fall into place - disenchanted Tories ( there are millions of them) will likely desert Reform - but they need a broad church of Toryism to bring them back into the fold - aided and abbeted by the chinless wonders of the current government.
"Credibility" "Seriousness" Nah. Normal people don't give two shits about SW1 wonkbrained nonsense like policy platforms. If Reform hanged nonces and got the trains running on time half the electorate would root for them.
Peter why do you still think the Tory’s are worth saving?
There are 3 ways the Uniparty can retain power at the next election:-
1) ban parties (like the AfD).
2) fiddle the electoral vote.
3) proportional representation.
Guess what?
The Tory’s are now suggesting proportional representation.
Do you still think they are worth saving?
The only way of saving the party is to move away from it like a snake sheds its skin,
What alternative party is there?
I always thought The Reform Party should be renamed the reform party.
First, they're not a political Party in any meaningful sense, purely a lightning rod/grievance vehicle/PR vehicle for Farage.
Secondly, they really are a pure party, literally having a great time coming up w "policy" japes, being loud and noisy, inviting everyone off the street on the promise of a good time.
But a serious Party, they are not.
Yet you'd put your money on them right now to break thru in 2029.
Scary prospect.
Voting any of the Uni parties is accepting defeat.
I’m hoping a new party will rise phoenix like, but failing that Reform.
They may not have a manifesto but when have parties ever complied with manifestos?
They don’t have a manifesto but Pete is lying to suggest they have no policies. They have their “Contract with the People” from 2024 which is being updated continually. That’s more than the Tories or Labour have!
Aspirations in blurbs and bullet-points is not policy.
Don’t you think aspirations like cutting tax, cutting benefits, slashing immigration, remigration of criminals and illegals, getting shot of net zero, cheaper energy for business and consumers, increasing defence spending and more around housing, a proper Brexit and importantly rowing back on the Blair constitutional changes isn’t an important start?
I agree the devil is in the detail and the “how to” is still to be worked out. But for your average Joe voter, big picture is enough. For people like you who will give confidence to voters I agree detail of “how to” is necessary. But we’re a long way out from an election and there’s time for that. What’s important is aspiration in my humble opinion.
And finally if you don’t want more of Labour there’s no other potential winner as the Tory brand is far too damaged and Badenoch not skilled enough to repair it.
It's a question of credibility. I do not believe even for a nanosecond that Reform is capable of forming a functioning government. The raw material simply isn't there, and they don't have a clue between them. They wouldn't have the first idea how to get anything back on track and have given us no indication how they would go about doing any of it. I think they will crash and burn inside a year. It will be Boris 2.0
Policy needs time to be developed properly, so Reform need to get on with it if they are to have a range of credible, wargamed policies in time for 2028/9.
Aspirations are meaningless soundbites. Yes, one of their aspirations is, as you say, cutting benefits. Their latest Marquis of Granby think tank policy? Abolishing the two-child limit on Universal Credit. So the opposite of their aspiration. They're all over the place. Think I'll let my membership lapse when it's up for renewal!
I think wishful thinking more than lying.
I’ve got my doubts about Reform too - but needs must!
The Tories are politically irellevent.
Thatcher's quote "If you just set out to be liked, you will be prepared to compromise on anything at anytime, and would achieve nothing".is the key point you make.
I've said for many years now that the trouble is if you get two people side by side on their soapboxes one advocating deporting illegal immigrants and the other saying we owe them our understanding and support the latter always wins the day because it is kinder and more compassionate.
There is an old saying long forgotten and ignored by weak cosmetic politicians, and applicable to bringing up children but also governance in general, that you often need to be "cruel to be kind".
All those people on here can mock Farage and Reform all they want and accuse them of lacking policies but they’re way ahead in the polls which was shown to be real on 1st May. Reform’s ideas on the economy are as valid as anyone’s moreso than Reeves’ and I have no idea what the Tories stand for anymore. But all of this is trumped by one obvious fact. Voters hate the Tories for 14 years of wasted time and Johnson’s big immigration experiment. Kemi can exhort the ghost of Maggie all she wants but she won’t win the next election and probably not the one after. Like it or not Reform will win the next election and Farage will become PM. Wouldn’t sensible people prefer that to this Labour shitshow?
Great essay Pete, one of your best. And 100% spot on.
It's interesting to see how your ideas and Carl Benjamin's are almost in sync. I've just watched his latest video on his Sargon of Akkad channel called 'On The Coming Civil War' - not that he agrees with the term; similar to you, who I think described it as a series of ongoing low level conflicts between various enclaves, etc.
But both of your points are similarly based around the moral aspects. In his video, that the UK establishment had to make a choice between serving two masters - the British Public that it is meant to serve; or some abstract moral doctrine based around internationalism. And chose the latter.
Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3owT94Qg4gI
I hadn't heard of Jenrick hunting fare dodgers, so looked it up on Youtube. Funny to see Femi the Doughnut on the results page with his spicy take about 'corrupt MP' harassing perfectly law-abiding knife-brandishing fare-dodgers! Ha ha. That's wild!!
"Everyone who has looked closely at Reform knows it is a profoundly unserious party" 💯 The Reform leadership is like the Wizard of Oz - performance with no substance. There is nothing behind the curtain.
If Jenrick were leader of the Conservative Party and they show they are serious about having a moral and philosophical framework, underpinning it with serious research and policy - including constitutional reform, otherwise the Blob will suffocate them at birth (ask Liz Truss) - I would vote for them again, in the absence of anything else. I would not vote for a party led by Badenoch - she hasn't got what it takes.
We need an economic policy mirroring Singapore's; full strength armed forces with the navy tasked to repel the invading dinghies; a repeal of the HRA 1998; deport, deport, deport; drill baby drill; nuclear power - SMRs; and DOGE on steroids.
Jenrick is already talking about the One Nations needing to leave the party if they're stirring the pot already/won't get on board with a policy to leave the ECHR.
Rumours of them talking to the Limp Dumbs.
The direction of travel is forming.
It would be a relief if the Conservatives split with all the wets going to the Limp Dems - where they should have been in the first place!
A good piece of writing but you badly underestimate how much the electorate has changed.
Blair mastered the art of promising the earth and telling people what they want to hear, ever since then we've all known that 'the truth' is unelectable. Farage is doing well precisely because he's a 'right wing' candidate who knows the game he has to play with the 'angry' voter.
My suspicion is that we'll have to exhaust 10 years of Starmer, then a term of what comes next (Farage won't be that person, agreed) before we consign 'confetti politics' to the dustbin of history.
Too many people are not grounded in reality and still want to be 'wooed' in some way, sad but true...
10 years of Starmer and there really will be nothing left.
Absolutely!