The Conservatives have taken full advantage of the sleepy summer months to make a series of eye-catching policy announcements without being overshadowed by competing news stories. Their basic strategy is undoubtedly a sound one. The Tories have succeeded in capturing the policy agenda during August, following a period when the Government had dominated the news with a succession of major departmental strategies. But the Tories’ choice of topics has raised eyebrows.
Like both of his predecessors, Michael Howard promised when he attained the leadership to focus on mainstream policy issues like the economy, health and education. But this latest Tory campaign has conspicuously shifted emphasis. Instead, the party has adopted fringe issues like speed cameras, windfarms, mobile phone masts and inheritance tax. The only mainstream issue that the party has touched on is crime, where Shadow Home Secretary David Davis promised a review of the Human Rights Act and an end to restrictions on stop-and-search. Even here, it is difficult to argue that the announcements added up to a coherent strategy on law and order. Why has Michael Howard changed direction?
Many observers have concluded that the Tories are returning to the core vote strategy pursued by William Hague in 2001. Like Howard, Hague initially attempted to fight Labour in the centre ground. Indeed, in 1999 he claimed that “one of the Conservative Party’s fundamental principles is that we all owe obligations to fellow members of society, including those who are poor and sick. And although free individual efforts must play a huge role in fulfilling these obligations, they will not be enough by themselves”. By the 2001 general election, however, that had all changed. Hague’s Tory manifesto embraced a populist rightwing agenda on crime, asylum, Europe and tax cuts.
The result was a disaster – or so it was then thought. The Conservatives made virtually no advance, and debate turned once again to the need for a more socially progressive policy agenda. Recently, however, this conclusion has been questioned. Some now argue that Hague’s strategy averted a catastrophic further collapse in Tory support, and that no other approach could have achieved that end.
Michael Howard now finds himself in a similar position to Hague. The party’s attempts to carve out distinctive policy positions on public services have met with widespread derision. The Tories still struggle to convince people that they would be reliable custodians of the nation’s schools and hospitals, and to make matters worse, these flagship policies have imposed a straightjacket on policy development in other areas. Money cannot be earmarked for the police, for defence or for tax cuts so long as the party is committed to matching Labour’s spending on health and education.
So where do the Tories now go? The answer, apparently, is a repeat of 2001. Having failed to win over the centre ground, the best the Tories can hope for is to mobilise their own core of support and acquit themselves respectably. The next Tory manifesto is therefore likely to focus on many of the same pushbutton issues of crime, asylum, Europe and tax cuts.
However, there is an additional, complementary dimension to this – a strategy being pursued with great vigour by the re-election campaign of President George Bush. You might call this the American Quilt Strategy. Rather than developing a single, coherent political message directed at the electorate as a whole, this strategy works by identifying issues that would not normally be regarded as mainstream, but which particularly motivate certain sections of the electorate. A winning coalition is formed by stitching these disparate issues together into a single patchwork of policy.
This has been a defining characteristic of Bush’s electoral strategy. In the words of Al From and Bruce Reed of the Democratic Leadership Council, “no White House has ever sold its soul in so many niche markets”. Notable examples include the multi-billion dollar prescription drug benefit, calculated to attract the votes of older voters in key states like Florida and Arizona, and the 2002 tariffs designed to appeal to steelworkers in West Virginia and Pennsylvania. The most egregious example was President Bush’s support for a constitutional ban on gay marriage, intended to mobilise the 4 million evangelicals who failed to vote for Bush in 2000.
Seen in this context, Michael Howard’s summer strategy looks very much like an attempt to create a British version of Bush’s American quilt. The Tories have sharpened their appeal to motorists by turning their fire on irritants such as speed cameras and traffic wardens. By adopting a nimbyistic position on windfarms, phone masts and even house-building, they hope to pick up the votes of those who live near to proposed developments. And inheritance tax, hardly a major issue for most voters, could nevertheless win them much-needed votes in key seats in the southeast where house prices have risen most rapidly.
Mr Howard has also made a conscious effort to increase his personal profile with particular segments of the electorate – for example, he recently gave an interview to Saga magazine, portraying himself as a champion of older people. He has also given interviews recently to the Jewish Chronicle and the Jewish News, despite attempts in his career to distance himself from his Jewish roots. This could make an impact not only in certain marginal seats with a high Jewish population, like Harrow West and Hendon, but could also broaden his appeal among the Churches and other faith groups.
Michael Howard has even launched his own version of Bush’s culture wars. Instead of targeting gay marriage like Mr Bush, Mr Howard has attacked the so-called “culture of political correctness” – a patchwork of rightwing anxieties encompassing everything from the rise in immigration to minority rights and family breakdown. Like Bush’s strategy, this is intended to appeal to voters who do not necessarily sympathise with the Tories’ core economic message, but for whom a socially conservative message resonates. These include many working class Conservatives who voted for Margaret Thatcher but whom the party subsequently lost.
But why should this approach work where the core vote strategy failed for Mr Hague? The answer could also be found on the other side of the Atlantic.
Traditionally, British political parties have succeeded by pursuing a swing voter strategy, encouraging a small number of centrist voters in marginal seats to switch allegiance and thereby shift the balance of power.
However, the assumptions underpinning this strategy do not necessarily hold in an era of declining turnout. This is because political parties do not necessarily need to persuade swing voters to switch sides in order to increase their support – they can instead concentrate on raising turnout among their own core supporters and winning over those who did not vote at all. In the United States, where turnout has long been significantly lower than in the UK, there is plenty of evidence that this approach yields results.
At first sight, this strategy did not appear to work for the Tories in 2001 – although turnout fell dramatically, it affected all parties more or less equally. However, in local and European elections, it has enjoyed much greater success – the impressive Tory showing in the 1999 European elections, for example. The 2001 result could therefore be misleading.
It is tempting to regard the new direction of Tory policy as an admission of failure – a recognition that they have little appeal to mainstream voters. But this does not take account of the possible effects of lower turnout. With many Labour supporters disillusioned over Iraq, one cannot necessarily expect a repeat performance of the 2001 general election, particularly if the Tories succeed in galvanising their core support. If Labour ignores the need to mobilise its own support, we could be in for an unpleasant surprise.