Season of tiffs and trepidation

27 Aug 13
Philip Johnston

Despite Ed Miliband’s difficult summer, it’s all to play for as the party leaders prepare themselves for their annual conferences

Not that long ago, after the Eastleigh by-election debacle, there was talk of a plot to unseat David Cameron. The rules of the Tory party, introduced after the coup against Margaret Thatcher in 1990, require 15% of the parliamentary party to notify the chair of the backbench 1922 committee that they have no confi dence in the leader in order to trigger a vote.

It was rumoured, though without much evidence, that the 1922 chair, Graham Brady, was in possession of 30 or so letters from disgruntled backbenchers – just 16 short of the benchmark. Yet the prime minister seems to have weathered the storm.

Instead, it is Ed Miliband who has experienced a wretched summer and who approaches the conference season with trepidation. Not only has he had a bruising run-in with Labour’s union paymasters, but there are mutterings of discontent on the backbenches and from the shadow cabinet itself. The view that Miliband is unelectable and is failing to articulate what his party would do in office is gaining traction in the party.

It would, however, be premature either to write off the Labour leader or to think that the coalition parties are out of the woods.

For the Conservatives, the UK Independence Party surge that threatened to put the skids under Cameron may have diminished, but it has not disappeared. Next year’s elections for the European Parliament could well see Ukip top the poll or come a close second, not least because most people will see their vote as disposable. That will cause panic in Tory ranks as marginal MPs see their seats threatened by even a modest Ukip showing at a general election.

Although a sharper and more populist message has been framed by the Tories’ Australian campaign guru Lynton Crosby, it may not win back enough defectors to burst the Ukip bubble. Nigel Farage, Ukip’s leader, will even stage an audacious raid on the fringes of the Conservative conference in Manchester to attend a Bruges Group event. The apparent collapse in Tory Party membership (Central Office declines to provide precise figures) reflects the disdain felt by traditionalist Tories for the current leadership.

The gradual recovery of the economy will help the coalition frame a narrative that austerity has worked. But the uncomfortable fact remains that by the time of the next election in 2015, most people will be worse off than they were in 2010. Moreover, there is the potential for further personal embarrassment for Cameron when his former communications director Andy Coulson stands trial shortly on charges arising out of the phone-hacking scandal.

Received wisdom is a dangerous bedfellow. For instance, there is a view among commentators that Nick Clegg has had a good summer, yet his party remains below Ukip in most polls. He can expect a fierce fight at the LibDem conference in Glasgow with activists who want to break with coalition policies on Trident, welfare, immigration and austerity before they are saddled with them in the election.

The party establishment might want to spend the week slagging off Labour, but the grassroots will be eager to position themselves for a possible linkup with Miliband in the event of another hung parliament.

Traditionally, the summer break is the time when the Opposition tries to make the political weather. This year, Labour may have managed to botch their seasonal offensive, but the bald truth is that few voters will have noticed, even if the news-starved media have lapped it up. Most opinion polls still have Labour on around 40%, and it should be remembered that, unlike the Conservatives, they can win an election with 36% of the vote.

Anyone writing off Miliband at this stage of the Parliament after a bad few weeks in the dog days of summer would be making a big mistake.

This opinion piece appears in the forthcoming September issue of Public Finance

Philip Johnston is chief leader writer of The Daily Telegraph

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