Labour is taking the centre right from the Tories

The general election campaign is becoming as much about what the Conservatives and Labour will look like after 4 July as it is about what they stand for today.

The Diane Abbott row, followed by a series of deselections and reselections in Labour, have led to accusations that Keir Starmer is leading a "purge" of the left. The treatment of Faiza Shaheen, one of the few Labour candidates in the 2019 general election who managed a substantial swing when she stood in Chingford and Woodford Green, felt like a convenient cull.

Some in Labour have argued that the moves are simply about restoring party discipline. As an ex-party chairman, I understand the importance of party discipline, but it is not the same as an unquestioning obedience to an ever-narrowing ideology and one that is increasingly at odds with the long and historic tradition of a party.

With Labour's lead in the polls getting stronger and a big Labour win looking increasingly likely, the party appears to have chosen this moment to re-position itself and set the tone for its priorities in government.

Labour seems to be shedding the left and centre left, and now appears to be embracing the right of centre.

It’s traditionally our space in the Conservative Party. Yet it's a space we have sadly increasingly vacated, and Labour is starting to occupy ground that we have ceded.

In the run-up to the 2010 election, we had firmly planted our tanks on Labour's lawn. From devolution to climate change, from big society to international development, from equal marriage to black and minority representation, many issues traditionally seen as concerns of the left became core campaign messages of the Conservative Party.

I define myself as a liberal conservative and a centre right politician, but sadly since Brexit, my party has embraced more of the right and less of the centre. It’s not just the centre ground that is there for the taking, it’s the centre right too. Labour, much like the Democrats did in the United States, are increasingly occupying this space.

The Conservatives in turn are following the Republicans down the far-right route, and Nigel Farage, much like Donald Trump, is ready to ride the wave of populism. Whilst Reform is officially working at this general election to oust the Conservatives, its honorary president, Farage, is working to become the new Conservatives.

In 2006, David Cameron, then newly elected leader of the Conservative Party, referred to Farage’s Ukip Party as “fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists”. Farage and his followers had no place in the Conservative Party that formed the coalition government in 2010 and we were not interested in courting them.

Despite Farage’s warm words, at the 2019 general election, Boris Johnson rejected an electoral pact. But by 2023, the Farage love-in was in full swing, with senior members of the party dancing and singing along with him at party conference. In 2024, Farage has his eye on a permanent relationship, a marriage which creates a new Conservative Party occupying the right and the far right. This would be a Tory party obsessed with immigration, disingenuous about Brexit and intent on dividing our country by ratcheting up culture wars.

Labour must not forsake its roots in the left as it repositions to win, and the Conservatives must not abandon its centre as it prepares to lose.

As a liberal centre-right conservative, my politics do not align with the far right and certainly not the hard left. Both extremes need to remain at the fringe of politics and that requires mainstream parties to embrace and build broad based parties in line with their traditions.

Sadly, the absence of any meaningful Liberal Democrat challenge has not helped. Ed Davey’s strategy of staying in the news through campaign stunts such as paddle boarding or riding waterslides does not cut it. This approach may be seen as a clever move by some in his team, but I'm afraid it projects as ad hoc interventions to others.

Davey says he is selling a serious message but not taking himself very seriously while doing so. He thinks the silliness is allowing their message to be heard and is getting the Liberal Democrats media airtime as a result. I disagree.

At a time when the Conservatives are experimenting with the far right and the Labour Party are abandoning its left, this election is a moment for the Liberal Democrats to set out their stall as the new centre. Not through a series of policy announcements, but an overarching ideological ethos.

This should include a commitment to building a broad church in the centre ground of politics, accept a wide range of political views, see the value of dissent and understand that internal opposition is healthy for a vibrant party - not something to be crushed as disloyalty.

03/06/2024