Mr. Boris Johnson’s resignation as Prime Minister of the UK on 7 July 2022 set the scene for a leadership contest within the ruling Conservative Party. There was no dearth of applicants, as eleven Conservative MPs put themselves forward for the nation’s top political job, while others briefly considered their options before deciding not to stand. Eight MPs secured the votes of at least twenty fellow MPs by close of nominations on 12 July, featuring in the first ballot the next day. Their numbers were gradually whittled down to two by the fifth, and final, round of voting on 20 July 2022, when former Chancellor Rishi Sunak was declared winner at 4 PM, with 137 votes, followed by Liz Truss, in second place, with 113 votes. The third contender, Penny Mordaunt, was forced out of the race, albeit just eight votes short of the number cast in favour of Truss.
It is now up to the eligible members of the Conservative Party, those who joined before 3 June 2022, to elect their next Party leader, who will then take over as Prime Minister. Voters will receive their ballot papers in the first week of August, between 1 and 5 August. It is intended that their decisions will be influenced by a couple of live television debates between the two candidates, on BBC One and Sky TV, along with a series of twice-weekly regional hustings, during which the competing parties will engage with local electorates across the country, delivering speeches, debating, and establishing rapport with adult voters and their children. Once they have made up their mind, Party members can either cast their votes online or choose to return their completed papers by post, with the ballot closing at 5 PM on 2 September. The winner will then be announced by Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 Committee of backbench Conservative MPs, on 5 September
It is worth taking a closer look at this all-important electorate as it sets about choosing the nation’s next leader, particularly at a time of growing mistrust of politicians and mainstream political parties and a widespread public disengagement from party politics. All members of the general public, aged 15 and over and also including British people resident overseas, are encouraged to join the Conservative Party. Party members must subscribe to its Code of Conduct and cannot simultaneously hold membership of any other registered political party. Standard annual membership costs £25 per year, with the option of payment in monthly instalments. Discounted rates are also available, set at £15 per year for serving or former members of the Armed Forces, and at £5 for those under the age of 26. The precise number of members is not known, as the Conservative Party has yet to update the Electoral Commission with its membership figures. The current membership of the Conservative Party is estimated to be around 180,000, or less than 0.3 per cent of the adult British population.
Party membership confers many benefits and provides opportunities for active involvement in the nation’s politics. Members can join their local Conservative Association, participate in campaign groups (Conservative Women’s Organisation, Young Conservatives), help select Tory candidates for local and national elections, and vote in leadership elections. More committed members may choose to hit the election campaign trail to canvas public support, attend the Annual Conference, and contribute to Party policy making through membership of the Conservative Policy Forum-the party’s “grassroots-led think-tank”. The most ambitious may stand as candidates in local or parliamentary elections and, if successful, commence their ascent of the political ladder to varying heights, driven by a lust for power and insatiable desire to be in the limelight, while claiming the noble intention to serve the public.
Although officially committed to “diversity”, recent research confirms that Conservative Party membership is not representative of the country as whole. The Party Members Project, a collaborative project funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and undertaken by Queen Mary University of London and the University of Sussex University, has relied upon an online panel of volunteers assembled by YouGov, a commercial opinion research company, in its quest to understand the membership of six major political parties in the UK. Their scrutiny of Conservative Party membership has revealed that 63 per cent of members are male, 95 per cent white British, 56 per cent live in London and the southeast of England, 80 per cent are ABC1s (upper middle-class), and 76 per cent voted for Brexit. The median age of this group is 57 years. These demographic features clearly do not match those of the Red Wall voters from the north and Midlands of England who voted Conservative in the 2019 general election, delivering the Party its landslide victory in the process.
Conservative core values centre around “personal liberty, democracy, and the rule of law”. The specific concerns of the day, driving the leadership elections, are more well-defined. Boosting economic growth appears to be the key concern for Conservative voters, as it is to most others. The electorate has to decide between the contestants’ contrasting visions on how to manage rising inflation, the cost-of-living crisis, high energy bills, and industrial action over public sector pay. A significant proportion of Conservative MPs, as well as many voters, seem to favour fiscal restraint (lower taxes, cuts in public spending) and limited government (deregulation, privatisation), and even perceive climate change action and a net-zero strategy as harmful to the British economy, at least in the short term. Immigration control is also high on the agenda for committed Conservatives, and the yet-to-be-implemented Rwanda plan for placing asylum seekers has gathered much grassroots support. To complicate matters, “anti-woke” sentiments, which prioritise culture wars over the more pressing fight for the economy, have also come to the fore. Such matters as equality and diversity initiatives, movements for racial justice, transgender rights, or even gender-neutral toilets perturb many Tory voters. It is up to the winner to read the electorate’s desires correctly and to achieve the right balance, through well-received policy initatives on the economy, immigration, foreign intervention (Ukraine), and the anti-woke agenda, among others.
It is possible that many potential voters have already made up their minds and are disinclined to change in the face of any new evidence that may emerge over the ensuing six weeks. Nevertheless, we can expect a period of aggressive campaigning, possibly with moody swings in the opinion polls as the contestants make gains or losses along the way. Either way, the public can rest assured, informed by the recent leadership contest, that the Conservative Party seems capable of accommodating a diversity of political ideas and economic strategies within its ranks. Irrespective of who wins on the day, the new leader can most certainly expect a rough ride as he or she aims to steer the country in a new direction.
Ashis Banerjee