18 MAY 2002, Page 25

KNICKERS TO KELVIN MACKENZIE

Bruce Anderson says the former editor of the Sun has come a cropper with his sneering

portrait of the Tory leader

TORIES hate being out of power. No Conservative opposition leader becalmed in the lower reaches of the opinion polls can expect much sympathy from his own supporters, who are quick to resent the failure to deliver an instant miracle. Yet impatience is not always a wise counsellor, especially when combined with the lack of sophistication displayed last week by Kelvin MacKenzie, determined to write down to his reputation.

Especially after the recent local election results, it is easy to find fault with lain Duncan Smith's performance. The Tory leader has sometimes given the impression that he is trying to avoid making an impact, and back in December I wrote a piece for this magazine complaining about this lack of urgency. But I later recanted, having concluded that I had underrated both the size of the task facing the party and the strategic finesse which the IDS leadership is displaying.

The Tories' current difficulties need to be seen in their historical context. In 1964, a formidable opposition campaign led to the defeat of the Douglas-Home government. At least as clever as Tony Blair, Alec Home was not only a much abler man than was generally recognised. His toenail clippings had more moral substance than Harold Wilson's entire being. At that stage. however, Wilson was the heavyweight champion of British politics. He stood for modernity, science and economic progress, while Alec Home was derided as a bumbling toff. Yet Sir Alec only just lost, with 43.4 per cent of the vote. If the fall of Khrushchev and the first Chinese atom bomb test had occurred just before polling clay instead of just after, the Tories would probably have won. As it was, Alec Home's losing percentage was higher than Margaret Thatcher's threeelection average. She only outstripped him once, by half a per cent, in 1979 — at the end of the Wilson/Callaghan administration, the worst government in modern British history. Yet if Jim Callaghan had gone to the country in October 1978, before the Winter of Discontent, he might have won, and even if Mrs Thatcher had secured a tiny majority, that would probably have proved insufficient to hold off the trade unions' onslaught, which would then have occurred in her first few months rather than Mr Callaghan's final ones. The early days of Thatcherism were a damned close-run thing.

So why did the Tories fail to advance from what should have been the low point of 1964, especially as the increase in wealth and home-ownership plus the contraction of the old-fashioned working class were moving political demographics in a Tory direction? There is a twin explanation: the decline of deference and the growth of social discontent.

Modern Britain may have grown richer; it has also grown chippier and more insecure. The modern workplace may offer the opportunity to prosper mightily; but it also denies the less successful either an alibi for failure or a comfortable niche for lesser talents. The modern workforce may be richer than its parents; it is also more anxious. Greater material rewards have actually inflamed class resentment and the politics of envy.

That is one of the Tories' burdens. In much of the public mind, the Tories are seen as the high-on-the-hog party, full of people who have it easy and do not have to worry. These negatives are only confirmed by the Tories' association with an hereditary ruling order in an age which resents any suggestion that Jack may not be as good as his master. Nor does the party receive any help from the legacy of Margaret Thatcher.

Margaret Thatcher won three elections, but only because her opponents were divided, and the Labour party was unelectable, Enough voters may have supported her largely because they feared the alternatives. They also formed the impression that the Tories were only interested in the striving, sharp-elbowed and successful, which excludes most of the population.

Tony Blair is not Michael Foot or Neil Kinnock. lain Duncan Smith cannot risk seeming exclusive, or his party will continue to be excluded from office — and he has a further problem. Traditionally, Tories did not have to worry about losing votes because they were thought to be uninterested in the public services. They had heavier guns: the economy, defence, foreign affairs, law and order. Today, however, all that artillery has either been neutralised or removed from the battlefield. Some of it may even have been captured by the enemy.

So Lain Duncan Smith has the unenviable task of fighting uphill, on traditional Labour territory, while leading a demoralised party which is widely despised. Yet Kelvin MacKenzie cannot understand the problem. Kelvin thinks that there are two easy solutions, which he dashes off with the speed of a Sun headline writer: come up with some quick policies, and act more like Maggie.

Apropos of policy, there is a point which would never occur to Kelvin, who is a delightful fellow, but has the attention-span of a mayfly. Policies require time and effort. It is easy to define the problem: the so-called British public services consume vast sums of public money while delivering a mediocre product. But how do we put that right — especially given the unfortunate political fact that the worse those services perform, the more the public seems addicted to them?

I do not know the answer; nor does Kelvin. I do know that Liam Fox, Damian Green, Michael Howard, David Willetts et al. are neither idlers nor lacking in intellectual muscle. •There are no easy solutions, any more than there were in the late Seventies, when the Tories were last in opposition. In those days, I was a footsoldier in the Conservative Research Department, and I can assure Kelvin that in late 1975 Mrs Thatcher's policy-making procedures

were less advanced than lain Duncan Smith's are today.

It is unlikely that Kelvin has ever bothered to read the Tories' 1979 Manifesto. That would take him about ten minutes, and ten minutes is a long time. It is an interesting document, however, partly because it goes to great trouble to avoid policy detail, offering the reader little more than an intellectual framework. But there are amusing specifics. How was Margaret Thatcher ever persuaded to put her name to the following statement: We attach particular importance to the coordination of [EEC] Member States' foreign policies. . .. Britain and her partners are best able to protect their . .. interests . . vy-hen they speak with a single voice.'

There is also a sentiment which Oliver Letwin could well have expressed: 'For violent criminals . . really tough sentences are essential. But in other cases long prison terms are not always the best deterrent.' Kelvin MacKenzie insists that Mr Letwin is a Leftie unfitted to be shadow home secretary; a curious charge to make against a chap who served his apprenticeship under Keith Joseph and Margaret Thatcher. Mr MacKenzie's definition of left-winger obviously encompasses anyone who believes that politics involves joined-up thinking.

In reality, the Letwin appointment was a tactical masterstroke. He is up against David Blunkett, who is blind and cunning. Far too crafty to allow the Tories any safe ground to his Right, Mr Blunkett could also muster a sympathy vote. If the opposition attempted to shout him down, they would he accused of kicking away his white stick and poisoning the dog. So instead, Mr Letwin intends to out-think his opponent. He is positioning himself to move in with criticism at a later stage, when it becomes apparent that the Blunkett tough talk is all talk. Then, more in sorrow than in anger, Oliver Letwin will be able to point out that though David Blunkett may sound like a heavyweight, he is just another spin-doctoring, spurious-promises headline-seeker. Sending Mr Letwin to shadow Mr Blunkett was the Tories' best hope of countering one of Labour's ablest front-benchers. It will not necessarily fail merely because it is too subtle for Kelvin MacKenzie.

There are legitimate criticisms of the Duncan Smith approach. One can understand why the Tories wish to accentuate the positive, but no opposition can afford to be too squeamish about negative politics. At present, IDS's front bench could be accused of being excessively gentlemanly. There may also be a lack of intellectual boldness. In order to win an election, Tories will also have to win some arguments. They will have to persuade enough voters that Mr Blair is wrong to claim that there is a choice between tax cuts and decent public services. The Tories should insist that low-tax economies are better at generating the resources to fund high-quality public expenditure. As the Eighties proved, the Laffer curve works: lower tax rates do produce higher tax yields.

The IDS team will also have to convince the voters to stop worshipping the NHS. It is absurd to give priority to the bureaucratic mechanism as opposed to the end-product: better healthcare. Yet the Tories will not be able to prevail in any of these arguments unless they are trusted. As lain Duncan Smith regularly reminds his party, George W. Bush was right. If people do not like you, they will not vote for you.

There is no guarantee that the IDS approach will succeed. But it is a realistic response to the Tories' difficulties — and at least the new leader has avoided the early crippling mistakes which sank William Hague. From the outset, Mr Duncan Smith knew that he ought to plan for a whole Parliament campaign, and not charge into thoughtless stunts.

Kelvin MacKenzie is one of nature's stuntmen, so he is naturally disappointed. But any opposition leader who is serious about becoming prime minister cannot afford to charge around like a lorry driver fired up by a Sun leader.