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Anyone got a favourite? Who are you most fond off?
Who's most likely to divide the party and thrust them into opposition for the longest possible period? Them.
A number of bald men fighting over a comb.
They’re all absolutely vile. Badanoch is meant to be a shoe in, but if it’s left to the members then it’ll be chinless pinstriped bell end Robert Jenrick, just because how much more of a Tory stereotype could you possibly be?
Who’s most likely to divide the party and thrust them into opposition for the longest possible period? Them.
In a plague on their houses way I'd wish the same.
But......there is a sizeable number of people in the country that don't think like me. They'll never think like me. But if I had a choice I'd rather they found a home in a tory party run by grown ups who can maybe show them how to colour in nicely. It'll still be a shit picture, but might not be one of those scary mutilation numbers the child psychologists lose their shit over. The alternative is they drift off towards the toad and they become as ugly on the inside as he is on the outside.
Yes, you could hope for a divided right wing splitting their vote between multiple parties for a generation but personally I think the risks are too high. So, somewhat contrarily I want a tory leader that'll make the tories saner, safer and popular....just not popular enough to get near Downing street any time soon!
It’s a difficult one. The obvious choices are:
- head more towards the right, on the basis that Reform is their main threat.
- head back towards One Nation style conservativism, on the basis that elections are won from the centre and trying to appeal to an increasingly extreme sector of the electorate is electoral suicide.
I suspect that are likely to drift further right, partly because and that most members who chose the leader are more right wing than the average Tory voter. I think that’s probably good in the short to medium term because it would likely make even more disaffected “blue wall” voters move to the Lib Dems in a future election.
Bunch of ****less wombles. Is there even a least worst option among them? I'm struggling to see who.
In the other thread I know a few people were saying they thought the Tories would drift back towards the centre after the defeat.
Absolute nothing I've seen from the Tory party since their defeat leads me to think they will do so. They are going to continue to head ever forwards into the Reform region of politics imo.
The sane voices in the party are either gone or marginalised.
There’s only one whose name I even recognised, and I’d love to put her in a seaside inflatable dingy and set her afloat in the middle of the North Sea. Without paddles. Or any means of communication. Up shit creek without a paddle, like her Party.
It will hopefully split the party, as Convert said, they will move to the centre in a bid to regain the power they crave, and the headbangers will go to Reform.
No idea how it will actually play out. A lot of Tory members are genuinely disgusted at the Johnson/Truss disaster, they aren't all rampant racists as we like to depict them. But there enough rampant racists to swing it the other way.
Priti Patel kept her head down throughout the Truss/Sunak period. Underestimate her at our peril.
I'm puzzled why any of them are standing now. Recent history has shown the relatively short term nature of Tory leadership and I'd expect this new leader to be replaced before the next GE. They'll have about 18-24 months to try to get the polls moving in their favour, then the squabbling will most likely start again.
In the other thread I know a few people were saying they thought the Tories would drift back towards the centre after the defeat.
Absolute nothing I’ve seen from the Tory party since their defeat leads me to think they will do so. They are going to continue to head ever forwards into the Reform region of politics imo.
The sane voices in the party are either gone or marginalised.
Absolutely this. It’s a sign of how much the party has now been taken over by the far right that even the supposed ‘moderate’ candidate, Tom Tuggenhat, is using a promise to withdraw Britain from the UCHR as part of his pitch. Because he has too to appeal to the membership who are all mental.
In reality, this would collapse the Good Friday Agreement as well as other international agreements and make this country an international pariah alongside Russia and Belarus
So its safe to say that none of the leadership hopefuls are on the same planet as most voters, who don’t spend their time obsessing over irrelevant nonsense like this. They want competent government, not a massive argument about what constitutes a woman’s gender
They've been consumed by their own culture war and now they can’t escape it
I'm hoping it will be Badenoch as she seems divisive and abrasive enough she might just cause the Tory party to split and that will be entertaining to watch.
This, and replaced at least once.
I'd have thought it's between Cruella and Kemi, but they all seem absurdly right to me. I also suspect, hope, that they are all tainted with the failures of the last government and it'll take a new rising star k*** for the electorate to start to swing in their favour. So unless they go for tugenhat, I doubt they will be selecting a future PM.
One rule for Tory leadership contests is that the favourite almost never wins. Boris was the exception. Not do previous contestants- Sunak and Howard won uncontested. Bad Enoch is the favourite and I don’t she’ll win. Democracy needs a decent opposition to function, but none of the above, appealing to an ever dwindling, ever more right focussed membership, by becoming a Reform tribute act, is unappealing. The leader after the next but one is the contest that matters.
The tories appear to be in a bad way at the moment and it's of their own making, but I do worry that they'll lurch further right and one of the muppets will gain traction.
We all joked about Trump in the beginning and look how that's turned out for the Republican party, a sack of mad rats on the brink of power...
Hiya,
They all seem to be running for the job, well except for Cruella.B. I guess she'll be off to Reform soon then 😉
I hope the ensuing infighting and bun fight will keep them in the wilderness for the next 20 years 😉
BR
Jerry
Ha ha every time I type out a the name of who I think it will be, I get half way through then think don't be absurd.
Fairly sure bravermen is sunk. I'm kind of leaning towards cleverly or tagnut, but again any sense of possibility seems to evaporate once written down. I watched a video of tagnut, he seems a right wally and walks in a way that does not portray a serious man.
TiRed is correct of course re favourites, but this time round they are all utterly hopeless
Fairly sure bravermen is sunk.
She announced yesterday that she wasn't standing, and made it clear that it was because she felt that she stood no chance. Although she claimed that she could the 10 nominations required
Oh I didn't know that Ernie, interesting. I had read a few days back that it didn't look good for her
Is the 1922 Committee not looking to change how they’re selected now, giving the increasingly elderly, increasingly right-wing membership less of a say?
https://news.stv.tv/politics/suella-braverman-rules-herself-out-of-tory-leadership-contest
"There is, for good or for ill, no point in someone like me running to lead the Tory Party when most of the MPs disagree with my diagnosis and prescription.”
Occasionally I agree with Braverman
“I’m puzzled why any of them are standing now. Recent history has shown the relatively short term nature of Tory leadership”
Stand
Get a sizeable but not winning level of support
Withdraw and gift that support to the winner
Become (shadow) Home Secretary
Launch leadership bid in 24-48 months after the stronger, but too keen to take the poison chalice candidates have been eliminated.
Lose the election anyway because your toxic and no one associated with the post-Cameron Tories stands a chance.
Ironically I think Labour doing a good job is the only way the Conservatives can get back into power. It needs 4-5years of competent government and things getting better to turn people off protest voting, which will re-unite the right wing vote and drag Tories back to the center.
but this time round they are all utterly hopeless
I doubt the Labour party leadership wil lose much sleep about any of the preent candidates.
Is the 1922 Committee not looking to change how they’re selected now, giving the increasingly elderly, increasingly right-wing membership less of a say?
They're trying to change the rules, but this time around it'll involve the elderly, increasingly right-wing membership. The same ones who the last time they were consulted thought Liz Truss was the answer
Its all academic anyway. All the candidates are standing on the same platform... to out-Reform Reform, so they're on a hiding to nothing right from the off.
They're not very bright, are they? Farage, Tice and Lee Anderson can all say what the hell they like as they know they'll never have to enact any of it. If the Tories follow them into the far right wilderness, which it definitely looks like they're going to do, then they'll be out of power for a generation.
Let them get on with it. I'm going to really enjoy watching it 😀
I just remember that time when the Tory leadership contest became a weird bragging contest about how much drugs they'd all taken in their rebellious phases
Its a sign of how much weve imported the performative puritanism of american politics that you couldnt see the current candidates doing that
I’m puzzled why any of them are standing now
For the most part the simple answer is ego - like the leader of almost any political party. You don’t get to the top of the greasy pole by just caring about your vision or policies - you also have a solid conviction that you out of all the others are the best and the only one that can make things happen. Look at Biden and Corbyn clinging onto the leadership role when the rest of the world could see their time had long since passed.
Getting to that position is so difficult that any time spent in at the top is recognised as an achievement - unless you totally Liz Truss it.
I’m hoping it will be Badenoch as she seems divisive and abrasive enough she might just cause the Tory party to split and that will be entertaining to watch.
Effectively the party has split. Reform is a splinter group. The key question is will Reform die away or amalgamate like other previous splinter groups.
In the other thread I know a few people were saying they thought the Tories would drift back towards the centre after the defeat.
Haven’t read the thread, but it’s not so much that any reasonable thinking person thinks the Tory’s will drift to the centre, rather that if they wish to be re-elected they should. The hilarious part of this Tory death spiral is their current chasing of reform voters, who won, what, 5 MP’s. Meanwhile centre-left labour won 411… bizarre electoral calculus going on at Tory strategy HQ. I’m glad the Tory membership get to choose the leader, cos they’ll choose someone totally unelectable.
Effectively the party has split
That’s as untrue as saying the Labour Party had split under Corbyn. Whilst there were big tensions between the left and right they stayed together and eventually navigated their way back to electoral success.
The Tory party is undergoing the same process now and it could resolve either way. That is what makes the current leadership contest so interesting.
In the other thread I know a few people were saying they thought the Tories would drift back towards the centre after the defeat.
Defeat after the next defeat, more likely. The British populace is mildly right of centre economically and left of centre socially. The party that embraces this majority wins. It's Labour's turn now. Wait and see where the Conservatives end up in another 10 years
I think Cruella has finally figured out that the future for front-line headbangers from the Bozza-Rishi Era is in propaganda/RW media flapping, her first stab at it on LBC apparently turned into a bit of a "ring in and vent" session (did anyone actually listen to it?).
I think Badenoch is probably the most dangerous of the candidates, mostly because she's not stupid and knows better than many of them just what volume to play her dog whistles at.
Not sure if the membership would go for her though, they're still pining for BoJo so whoever can look/behave more like that might be in with a shot, Tommy Tugnuts perhaps?
Ultimately leading the Conservatives is still a poisoned chalice role, like it's been for the last decade+, requiring someone suitably narcissistic, Machiavellian and deluded about the public's perceptions of them.
The difference now is that they'll be leading a widely disliked opposition, licking their wounds after an electoral kicking, their appeal to most of the population is oddly probably less of a worry. The Membership will probably get someone more like the kind of bastards they like prefer for a bit.
The focus is going to be on either fending off or re-absorbing the Reform/UKIP nutters. I think it's going to be a while before they try to reclaim the centre.
The other thing to remember is that just because someone scores the gig today, doesn't mean they'll still have it in five years. Tories do like to knife their leaders in the back more frequently that we tend to hold general elections [ref: the last 14 years].
Historically, when they've been defeated previously there's been a lurch even further to the loony right before they drift back to the centre to become electable again, so I'm guessing Kemi Badenoch?
As pointed out above, they are in a really interesting bind though. For the first time that I can remember the right wing vote has been split between the Tories and Reform. As a lefty this is very satisfying, as we have been trying to manage this for decades! It does make it hard to predict what will happen though, especially in these social media fuelled divisive times.
Re who would I like to see elected, it seems that Tugendhat is the least loony so I guess him?
Effectively the party has split. Reform is a splinter group.
Au contraire. The sane lot were evicted from the party by Johnson after his victory in 2019. He felt threatened by anyone with an IQ not in single figures and made loyalty to the inherently stupid Brexit project the only consideration for high office. Hence the present absolutely woeful standard of candidates.
The fact that they've already reached the conclusion that they lost the election because they weren't right wing enough just says it all. They think that their mission is to become Reform. Every single candidate during this campaign will perpetually bang on about immigration, trans people, immigration, withdrawing from the ECHR, immigration, immigration, gender nuetral dogs, immigration, what bastards the EU are, and immigration.
They just can't help themselves. Its going to be hilarious 😀
One rule for Tory leadership contests is that the favourite almost never wins. Boris was the exception. Not do previous contestants- Sunak and Howard won uncontested. Bad Enoch is the favourite and I don’t she’ll win.
I was just gonna say similar.
I think we're back in "won't be the favourite" territory now, with the caveat that they might still pick someone shit - just because the members are so detached from reality.
Depends what the leanings of the remaining Tory MPs are (I dunno) and how and when the members are going to get a say (dunno that either).
It's frankly hilarious that sunak doesn't look that bad an option right now
The sane lot were evicted from the party by Johnson after his victory in 2019. He felt threatened by anyone with an IQ not in single figures and made loyalty to the inherently stupid Brexit project the only consideration for high office. Hence the present absolutely woeful standard of candidates.
100%. Anyone intelligent that also has scruples was automatically barred from supporting Brexit by its very nature. Add in the requirement that Johnson had to seek a harder exit than necessary to justify his Get Brexit Done bullshit and here we are. Politically (and acutely in the case of the Tories) Brexit was the greatest reverse talent show in history.
Much of the Culture War crap that followed (the isolation of vulnerable people during covid facilitated it) stems from the Tories scrabbling around trying to explain why everyone isn't on £75k per year and Mr & Mrs Sharma two doors down haven't been deported yet. The sight of a once-serious political party hitching its wagon to a series of ever more outlandish lies is pitiful. It also leaves them vulnerable to people peddling the same prejudices and lies - just more extreme.
But the Tories chose this route. There were multiple opportunities to do the right thing, but they got high on populism and now they've lost the high and only have the addiction.
**** 'em.
rats in a sack. the briefings are happening
Kemi Badenoch, the frontrunner to be the next Conservative party leader, has been accused of creating an intimidating atmosphere in the government department she used to run, with some colleagues describing it as toxic, the Guardian can reveal.
Ordinarily you might say that after a defeat that heavy that it's not a leadership contest you would want to win, but Starmer's success with Labour challenges that to an extent, although I can't see Labour throwing it all away in a single Parliament (again, that is what we thought post 2019, so anything is possible). The Tories should stay in the centre ground but they will probably tack further right.
The Tories have nowhere to go. Labour were able to move to be a centre party to win the election. Reform turned up and took enough far-right fantasists to royally screw the Tories.
I fully expect the Tories to veer even further to the right. Either to win back their bigots from Reform or to merge with them. I wish them all the worst in their endeavours.
"The Tories should stay in the centre ground but they will probably tack further right."
Hmmm not so sure. They may well do of course but they know as well as we do that the far right racist pensioner vote is a dying breed and it wasn't nearly enough to work this time around already. Its been proven time and time again that when the UK feels like time for a change it wants the same thing but with a different name. Centre rightish with a bit of a 'we will look after the already well off because they have earned it unlike those workshy poor' etc. I mean just look at the recent so called Labour incumbents...
At the end of the day we ain't revolutionaries like the French swinging from monarchy to socialist to fascist and we aren't as mad and divided on religious grounds like the US. We are Brits and we like things as they should be which is a sensible government that looks after the slightly selfish and introverted hard working British people which obviously means the lucky and most Southerners.
I'm not saying Badenoch won't win btw - she strikes me as an adept chameleon that can change her spots overnight as she clearly has no actual principals. Patel, I'm not so sure about = she has more backstory which may be harder to shed.
Kemi Badenoch, the frontrunner to be the next Conservative party leader, has been accused of creating an intimidating atmosphere in the government department she used to run, with some colleagues describing it as toxic
Surprised, moi? <Miss Piggy Voice>
Hmmm not so sure. They may well do of course but they know as well as we do that the far right racist pensioner vote is a dying breed
we have an ageing population…
and it wasn’t nearly enough to work this time around already.
but the easy mistake to make is to think the way to win back reform voters is to be more like reform, it’s actually to be less like the post Cameron tories!
Its been proven time and time again that when the UK feels like time for a change it wants the same thing but with a different name. Centre rightish with a bit of a ‘we will look after the already well off because they have earned it unlike those workshy poor’ etc. I mean just look at the recent so called Labour incumbents…
yes but Labour got there from Milliband by first going via a more extreme stereotype of “core Labour” which appealed to the membership but no the voters.
At the end of the day we ain’t revolutionaries like the French swinging from monarchy to socialist to fascist and we aren’t as mad and divided on religious grounds like the US. We are Brits and we like things as they should be which is a sensible government that looks after the slightly selfish and introverted hard working British people which obviously means the lucky and most Southerners.
even on election night some commentators were saying the losers would probably head more towards their extremes and that was a mistake. Expect the snp may up the noise on Indy.
We have an ageing population true but the happy set of circumstances and conditions that turned a certain generation into the 'haves' , house prices far outstripping inflation, no university debt and defined benefit pensions have not been repeated. This means future generations growing older will not in my opinion in general have the same goals and outlook as the current batch over 60s
"yes but Labour got there from Milliband by first going via a more extreme stereotype of “core Labour” which appealed to the membership but no the voters."
I don't understand your point, how does this differ from me saying the UK voter doesn't like extremes?
And commentators (including and especially me!) can be very wrong.
“yes but Labour got there from Milliband by first going via a more extreme stereotype of “core Labour” which appealed to the membership but not the voters.”
I don’t understand your point, how does this differ from me saying the UK voter doesn’t like extremes?
I think you're both making the same point. This is a good read by Ian Dunt (always worth reading), making the point that the party membership selecting the leader, instead of MP's, gave the Labour Party Jeremy Corbyn (who as repellent to the wider electorate) and the Tory membership gave us Liz Truss as PM. The membership of parties is in no way representative of the general voter.
The truth that dare not speak its name
I can honestly see this Tory Leadership election giving us the leader of HM opposition Robert Jenrick. Badanoch has been nailed on favourite at 2/1 for about 18 months now, but as has already been pointed out, the Tories never end up with the favourite when it goes to the membership. Its going to be the middle-aged, chinless, pin-striped white bloke every time