BIRMINGHAM, England — Holding an extended contest to find the next leader of the Conservatives was meant to be a healing exercise. Instead, some members just want it all to stop.
As the party gathers for its annual conference in Birmingham this week, not everyone’s convinced that the chance for some proper soul-searching was worth it — especially as the Labour Party encounters a rocky start to its time in government.
Nothing has been straightforward since the Tories suffered a devastating electoral defeat in July, losing 251 seats and suffering their largest-ever fall in vote share. Surviving MPs wrangled over the timeline for electing a new leader to replace Rishi Sunak — and eventually opted for a 14-week race with multiple stages.
Two candidates have already been knocked out. The remaining four — Kemi Badenoch, James Cleverly, Robert Jenrick and Tom Tugendhat — will face off at this week’s party conference, giving competing speeches to the party faithful, before the field is whittled down to two.
The winner will then be elected by party members, with a result announced Nov. 2. And that gives Labour, on the ropes over its own shaky performance in office, breathing room for its big government-wide budget next month.
Ben Houchen, Conservative mayor of Tees Valley, said the extra long face-off “doesn’t add any additional value” at a “critical time … in the context of an upcoming budget.”
Unity drive
The main motivation behind the format of this year’s leadership was to bring some stability to a party that in recent years has enjoyed anything but.
The Conservatives switched prime ministers three times in five years because of internal ructions, with each changeover accompanied by rancorous disagreement over the direction of travel.
MPs from all wings of the party agree that voters at large and their own membership hate this kind of discord, and see it as a big factor in their defeat at the election.
The leadership race between Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss, consisting of a whole summer where the pair tore strips off each other in public, was seen as especially damaging.
Andrew Bowie, shadow energy minister and a Badenoch backer, said members “feel incredibly bruised” by the actions of the party in recent years and “it is entirely appropriate” for them to be given a proper chance to meet and cross-examine the candidates.
One new Tory MP, granted anonymity to speak frankly like others in this piece, chimed: “We have to ensure that as a party we get it right first time so that we can earn the right to be heard again.”
Britain’s Shadow Minister for Security, Tom Tugendhat, speaks at a press conference to announce his bid for Conservative Party leadership. | Carl Court/Getty Images
Another distinct feature of this contest aimed at building unity has been the Conservative 1922 committee’s introduction of a so-called yellow card system in an effort to prevent leadership candidates from indulging in personal attacks on one another.
A campaign manager for one of the candidates said it was “right that it should be a collegiate campaign” because “we have to break from the fighting and the factionalism.”
Jenrick, whose star has risen during the campaign, has also told supporters of his intention to stop such infighting as leader.
At a dinner held last week at the exclusive Brooks’ Club in Mayfair, he told those attending that he wanted to see an end to the proliferation of formalized caucuses within the Conservative Party, which became known last year as “the five families.”
He argued the groups had done more harm than good, according to two guests, and had to come to an end because “things are too serious.”
Punches pulled
Yet the process itself has become a point of contention as members head to Birmingham to size up the hopefuls.
Nothing has been straightforward since the Tories suffered a devastating electoral defeat in July. | Leon Neal/Getty Images
Eddie Hughes, a former Tory MP and minister who lost out at the election, called it “incredible” that the party would not be able “to properly capitalize on the problems that Labour is experiencing because we don’t have a leader and won’t have one for another five weeks.”
Houchen has previously called it “nonsensical” to “drag out the pain” when all the candidates were relatively well-known figures who had spent years at the top of government.
Henry Hill, deputy editor of grassroots website ConservativeHome, said there was “a question as to whether the length of time allotted has been really worth it, given not a lot has happened.”
He also queried the decision to discourage the candidates from attacking one another directly.
“The downside is you end up with a rather anemic contest,” he said. “The [House of] Commons is after all designed as an adversarial means of holding people to account, and that’s a lot more interesting,”
A former Tory MP who lost in a traditional safe seat said it meant that “at no point have the gloves come off” and “it has meant people struggle to really articulate a difference between them.”
Activists and MPs alike hope that the annual gathering could yet provide the setting for some kind of breakthrough moment where one or more candidates make their audience sit up and take notice — but not everyone will be around to see it.
Many of those who lost their seats are expected to swerve an “alumni reception” (alternatively dubbed “the losers’ reception” by attendees) organized for Tuesday.
As the same ex-MP remarked: “Quite a few people just think, ‘why on earth would I put myself through that?’”
Noah Keate contributed to this report.
