Lord Frost is unequivocal. Defeat for the Tories is “imminent” he writes in The Telegraph, and he’s now focusing on where the blame lies (clue: not with him or Brexit). He acknowledges that Reform UK is hurting them but puts that down to the Tories being “such poor representatives of genuine conservative politics ourselves.” And for that he points te finger at “the party leadership, their advisers, and their ministerial supporters” who have been “outmaneuvered, surrounded by yes-men, oblivious of public opinion, blind to the consequences of their decisions.”
Frost says “it's important not to engage in self-delusion” before doing precisely that. He says the Conservative Party and the wider conservative movement “cannot include people who should really be in parties to our Left. It certainly can’t include those responsible for the strategy leading to the current disaster."
He is talking about people who in 2016 were leading lights of conservatism until the party accidentally adopted the central policy of UKIP and began to shed moderates while party ranks were being swelled by the fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists who had previously made up UKIP's entire membership.
It’s no secret that the party is losing support to Reform, UKIP's latest successor, but that isn’t why they are headed for oblivion. They are also losing support to Labour and the LibDems, as the party has shifted further to the right and away from the centre. And in particular, the Tories have become toxic to the 18-24 age group where just 7% describe themselves as being close to the Conservatives. The figure for Labour is 72%.
No political movement can survive with those numbers.
Brexit gets a mention just once in Frost's piece with a sympathetic nod to "strong Conservatives, MPs who have stood up for Brexit and conservative values" being pushed out into a campaign that could never succeed. He doesn't join the obvious dots which should be visible from outer space.
Neither does Frost begin to acknowledge or even recognise Brexit has been negative in every possible way, economically, culturally, and diplomatically and has become the sinking ship dragging the party under. The Tories are 'tethered to the mast of Brexit' as one anonymous senior Tory MP said in 2016 with some prescience.
His silence on the ‘benefits’ of leaving the EU and the many empty promises made between 2016 and 2021 is the most revealing. A political party that is forced to disown its major flagship policy of five years previously and one that was an article of faith for the movement’s right wing for thirty years and more cannot survive.
Like all extremists in the position he finds himself, the fault lies with others for not being sufficiently extreme. As the nation is about to undergo a sharp left turn, Frost argues that the Conservative Party needs more right-wing policies. It is totally irrational. I confess I’ve never understood why these people cannot see which way the wind - or more properly in this case, the hurricane - is blowing.
Voters are sick and tired of conservatism and that will become clear on 5 July.
One can only assume that Frost is sympathetic to Farage’s policies if he believes they represent genuine conservatism and if so, that must be a measure of how far to the right the party of Clarke, Hurd, Howe and Heseltine has shifted
Reform UK under the newly installed leader Farage (who owns the company anyway) is coming under real scrutiny, the kind that he isn’t used to.
The sensational Channel 4 footage of a Reform party canvasser in Clacton, Andrew Parker, coming out with shocking racist tropes isn’t a one-off since several other Reform candidates and acolytes have already emerged in this campaign. Some racists don't confine their comments to the closet.
However, the clear racist language and the publicity that Farage has got is going to prove a boon to Reform UK in some eastern constituencies where that kind of publicity is priceless. I am afraid it is going to reveal that in some places racism exists in plain sight. They are attracted to Nigel Farage like moths to the flame that consumes them.
On BBC he laughably claimed he had “done more to drive the far right out of British politics than anyone else alive and had ‘destroyed’ the British National Party.” What he has done is remake the BNP as a political force and on the way, destroy One Nation Conservatism, something we’ll all regret.
Next Friday, the Tories will be consigned to oblivion but Farage will continue to be the grit in their shoes as they wander around the political wilderness for many years to come.
