Why conservative voters are likely to turn against Tories

Britain's Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. Picture: Adrian Dennis/AFP

You may well wonder why the Conservative Party is, on the basis of opinion polling, facing the worst defeat by any of Britain’s major political parties in more than 100 years.

From winning 365 seats in the 650-seat House of Commons under Boris Johnson not five years ago, it will struggle to win 100 seats next month. It’s not difficult to see why. People vote for conservative parties in Western democracies because they perceive they are better economic managers, are strong on defence and national security, and driven less by ideology and more by reality and common sense. The Conservative Party has not lived up to this. That is why it has lost so much of its core vote to either Nigel Farage’s insurgent Reform Party or to apathy and abstention.

Boris Johnson at the announcement of him becoming prime minister in 2019. Picture: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

For Conservative voters the record of the past 14 years makes dismal reading. The Tories got off to a reasonable start by reducing government spending and trying to get the deficit and debt under control after more than a decade of Labour government. But when Boris Johnson became prime minister, they abandoned what became known as economic austerity and opened the public cheque book. This expansion in spending exploded during Covid. But instead of trying to rein in spending, they just increased taxes. The tax burden in the UK is now the highest in 70 years.

Then there is immigration. It’s not that the British people are against migrants, they just want immigration controlled at a reasonable level. In 2010 the Conservatives promised they would reduce net migration to below 100,000 a year. Last year immigration was more than 700,000.

The Conservatives never set a ceiling on the number of skilled migrants or family reunion visas it would grant. The government economic departments and ministers have, on the contrary, demanded high rates of migration because it contributes to economic growth, but not necessarily growth in per capita GDP.

As for integration, this has been a failure in parts of Britain. There are whole suburbs of British cities that have become Bantustans – where people from distinct ethnic communities congregate and live according to the practices of the countries they’ve left rather than integrate into mainstream society. This creates alienation and resentment. Yet after 14 years of Conservative government they have done nothing.

The Tories have reduced the size of the armed forces. That is gradually being reversed, but the army has shrunk by a quarter since they were elected.

Then there is the transgender debate. The Conservatives have allowed children to be given puberty blockers and even surgery in order to change their genders. It’s one thing to accommodate gender transition for adults but to impose those practices on children has outraged mainstream Britain.

There’s no doubt the Covid lockdowns upset many Conservative voters who believe in individual freedom and individual choice. Yet during Covid the government presided over several lockdowns. No proper cost benefit analysis was done of the benefits of lockdowns against the huge social and economic costs. The country is still paying the price. The sacred but Stalinist National Health Service is a shambles, the mental health of children has been scarred and their educational performance hampered, large numbers of people have exited the workforce with no intention of returning and the practice of working from home has emasculated the work ethic in both the public sector and in private companies.

Protesters holds signs and placards as part of a freedom demonstration in Parliament Square, London, in 2021. Picture: Martin Pope/Getty Images

And then there’s climate change. The Conservative government has approached this with the same zeal as the Albanese government. Huge amounts of money have been spent subsidising renewable energy and other initiatives. The idea is that by doing so the UK will stop global warming. Well, given it only contributes 1 per cent of anthropogenic CO2 emissions, these initiatives have had no measurable effect on the climate. But they have certainly pushed up energy prices, reduced the competitiveness of British firms, exported manufacturing industries and hit the living standards of mainstream society. Now there is a familiar story.

And finally there were the abominable internal divisions within the government. Wets versus Dries, conservatives versus progressives, Cameroons versus Boris Johnsonians, Brexiteers versus Remainers – those divisions led to the overthrow of three prime ministers, Theresa May, Johnson and Liz Truss. David Cameron resigned after losing the Brexit referendum and Rishi Sunak is about to be evicted from No.10 by an angry electorate.

There are harsh lessons here for centre-right parties around the world. First, they can’t afford to abandon the demands of their core constituencies: sound money management, competitive markets, welfare for those in need but not beyond, strong defence and alliances, encouragement of family life without the heavy-handed intervention of the state and so on. Secondly, no one can expect voters to reward poor governance. People believe governments have failed on both the economy and immigration. Likewise, in the British election voters will look elsewhere. Whether the Labour government will do any better – that’s another question.

Alexander Downer was foreign minister from 1996-07 and high commissioner to the United Kingdom from 2014-18.