Why Britain’s Conservative Party Is Slipping Into Irrelevance
Once the natural party of government, Britain’s Conservatives are now losing figures, voters, and relevance—while Reform UK reshapes the Right without them.
Once the natural party of government, Britain’s Conservatives are now losing figures, voters, and relevance—while Reform UK reshapes the Right without them.
Political figures had until recently talked (sensibly or otherwise) about Robert Jenrick, a former immigration minister, being a possible next leader of the Conservative Party—one who, unlike current position holder Kemi Badenoch, could finally set the party on the right path.
Jenrick brought that conversation to a dramatic halt on Thursday when he joined Nigel Farage’s Reform UK, saying that this—as opposed to anything he might have been able to do in the Tories—was “uniting the right” of British politics.
This is bad news for the Conservatives, who lost other senior members to Reform both before and after Jenrick’s shift. Most recently, former shadow minister Andrew Rosindell quit the party and joined forces with Farage on Sunday, saying:
I now believe that the Conservative Party is irreparably bound to the mistakes of previous governments and unwilling to take meaningful accountability for the poor decisions made over so many issues.
Responding to this recent wave of defections, commentator Chris Bayliss suggested “there is now no chance that the Conservative Party will address its basic political incoherence,” adding: “It is destined to be swallowed up by the fault lines of our age.” Publishing his thoughts, The Critic magazine ran with the title: “The Conservatives are doomed.”
One of the worst things to happen to the Tories in recent months is not just the loss of some of its most senior figures but the decline in the number of Britons thinking about—nevermind supporting—it.
Commenting on focus groups carried out by pollsters, Dominic Cummings, who served for a time as former Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s top adviser, said earlier this month that voters have “moved on from hatred” for the Conservatives.
They just say things like, “I just don’t think about the Tories anymore,” because they’re just not relevant to our lives anymore … So people don’t even want to discuss how much they hate the Tories … They have moved on to a place even worse than universal loathing and hatred to a kind of ‘you’re just waiting to die’ space.
Whether voters who have backed the party for most of their lives are able to maintain this irreverent stance when the next general election comes around remains to be seen.
Michael Curzon is a news writer for europeanconservative.com based in England’s Midlands. He is also Editor of Bournbrook Magazine, which he founded in 2019, and previously wrote for London’s Express Online. His Twitter handle is @MichaelCurzon_.
