When the PM is gone, his philosophies will remain
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Version 0 of 1. The readiness is all: which is another way of saying that the timing of any departure can accrue colossal force. The battle to decide Tony Blair’s exit date dominated the life of his government and hardened the public impression of a political class obsessed by its own fate rather than the nation’s. As the many memoirs attest, Blair was anxious that Gordon Brown would turn away from New Labour, and so allow the party to backslide. But not even Blair, in his darkest night-terrors, can have imagined that, eight years on, the movement he led for more than a decade would be on the verge of choosing Jeremy Corbyn as its leader. The subtext of his interventions in the present contest is clear: do you get now why I was reluctant to stand down? No such dilemma afflicts David Cameron, who has what might be called the Posterity Advantage. None of his likely successors aspire to unpick his work. George Osborne, Theresa May and Boris Johnson have many differences of character and priority. But they sign up to the essentials of Cameronism: fiscal conservatism matched by monetary activism, welfare reform matched by a national living wage, strong defence matched by a commitment to international aid, robust action at home and abroad against extremism. Related: George Osborne’s coup: converting Labour to fiscal conservatism | Matthew d’Ancona Blair had to assume that his chancellor would oppose any No 10 initiative on principle. Yet Cameronism is as much Osborne’s work as the prime minister’s. The chancellor, a metropolitan liberal rather than a shire Tory, has his own projects and preoccupations – notably the northern powerhouse – and does not, for instance, share his boss’s opinion that pensioner entitlements are off limits to reform. But he would not assume the premiership as Brown did in 2007, all but declaring: “Thank God he’s gone!” Indeed, as was reported last week, there are Tory MPs who would like Cameron to break his pledge to step down after two terms as prime minister and to lead the party into the 2020 election. Warming to the ego as such chatter must be – and it sure beats the usual regicidal whispers facing a party leader – the PM knows that this way madness lies. At the weekend, he told the Today programme: “I stand absolutely by what I said. Ten years is a good long time to be prime minister.” In private, Cameron is even more candid about the psychiatric folly of staying in No 10 for more than two terms. Though it is hard to imagine parliament passing the legislative equivalent of the US 22nd Amendment limiting individuals to two terms as president – a prime minister is not directly elected, but commands the confidence of the Commons – Cameron senses a convention taking shape whereby prime ministers serve for two parliaments and then sling their respective hooks. In an interview with me in January 2013, he first revealed his hope to serve a second “full term”. I pressed him at the time on what he meant by this and he insisted that he meant it literally – and not elastically as had Blair. Cameron’s allies insist that this remains his intention: to serve the full parliament. All talk of an early exit after the EU referendum is unfounded, they say. The prime minister emphatically does not want a third term. But he emphatically does want a second. Under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act, the next election will be held on 7 May 2020, and, assuming normal bank holidays, the Commons will be dissolved on March 30 of that year. This, then, is the latest possible date for his departure, the terminus ante quem for Cameron to go, and to hand over to an elected successor. Of course, common sense and good manners will dictate a somewhat earlier departure. The question is: how much earlier? For now, the issue has no toxicity for the Tories, and arises only from time to time. In an interview with Der Spiegel, Johnson said of his own ambitions that “there’s not going to be a vacancy until late 2018, if not later”. Downing Street sources insist that the London mayor’s speculation does not reflect privileged information. But there is no implicit reprimand of Johnson for daring to name a year, no terseness of response as there often was when the free-wheeling mayor “misspoke” during the coalition years. The PM and his inner circle proceed on the basis that none of his likely successors is in a tearing rush and that all share an interest in playing it long. They have a common interest in showing the selectorate – their fellow Tory MPs and the party membership – what they can do in a Conservative-only government. Johnson has to establish himself afresh as more than a charisma-generator. Osborne, meanwhile, needs time to complete his fiscal mission and to make sure that he is personally identified with the more ambitious components of the government’s strategy – especially the national living wage, which (I believe) has the scope to transform the political terms of trade. All this will start to assume a greater importance on 12 September when the Labour party hails its new leader. The Tories, naturally, are planning an aggressive welcoming party, forcing him or her to make public decisions on tough new strike laws and Osborne’s fiscal responsibility charter. The objective is to frame Ed Miliband’s successor as unelectably leftwing within days of his or her election. There will be part of the Tory psyche that is unnerved by the election of a new Labour leader – especially Corbyn Yet there will also be part of the Tory psyche that is unnerved by the election of a new Labour leader – especially if it is Corbyn. That same part will grow irrationally restless for change at the top of the Tory party, too. Back from holiday, Cameron and his inner team should start to think very deeply about Corbyn and about what he represents. Dismissing him as a cryogenically preserved 80s leftwinger will only feed the energy he is feeding upon. He is a much tougher customer than Miliband and much harder to pin down than Brown. If Cameron wants to keep control of his own departure date, he will have to show quickly that he has the measure of the fourth Labour leader to face him across the dispatch box. Mark my words: this one will be the toughest. |