The mood music amongst Tory MPs following conference has definitely improved. In general they’re pleased to finally see some “meat on the bones” as far as policy is concerned. Every Tory MP Guido has spoken to praised Kemi’s speech. The deeper problem remains: the party is polling well behind Reform, and one speech won’t alter the polling fundamentals…
One MP told Guido they thought it was “the best leader’s speech [they’d] seen in years“, and colleagues “got a much-needed boost” from Kemi’s performance. “Where was this for the last year?”, said another. A third admitted it’s “quite a shift going from no policies to a sh*t tonne of policies. The good thing with announcing so many is we can just stick with the ones that land well.” So there’s a fear that some of what was announced may, in due course, be junked…
The best news for LOTO is the stamp duty rabbit is proving particularly popular with the backbenches (“at last we have some policies that sound properly Conservative“). The bad news is many MPs don’t think it will change much in the long-term, and the real test is – as it always was – the local elections next May. Even Kemi herself has said as much…
There’s also still plenty of talk about making sure “the next centre-right government” is capable of implementing the kind of agenda unveiled yesterday. Which is clearly not the same thing as ‘the next Conservative government’…
