Further Thoughts
on Ian Duncan Smith
A friend has just
telephoned me to take issue with my Free Life Commentary of earlier today. He
accuses me of extravagant optimism about the intentions of the new Conservative
leadership. In particular, he
insists that I should bear in mind the following three points: that Mr Duncan
Smith did nothing much to oppose Labour during the first four months of his
leadership; that he has even competed with Labour to show which is the more
politically correct party in terms of the debate over multi-culturalism; and
that he may have sold out on Europe by saying that he will not seek to overturn
a "yes" vote in a future referendum on the Euro.
I accept that I may in the past few weeks have given in to an uncharacteristic
optimism about the intentions and prospects of the Conservative Party, and that
I may be wholly wrong in my analysis. Perhaps we are in for another big
disappointment. However, there do seem to be good answers to the objections
raised above. I will briefly explain them.
The Failure to
Oppose
Mr Duncan Smith
became Leader at the beginning of an international crisis. Had he begun with a
set of shrill denunciations, he would either have been ignored by the media, or
have opened himself to charges of seeking to gain unfair advantage from a
Government that was plainly occupied with other business. Therefore, it was
reasonable for him to keep a fairly low profile until the crisis was over.
The crisis now is over. Doubtless, the war has raised problems that will not go
away. But these do not amount to a crisis. Indeed, in its determination to
maintain a presence in Afghanistan after the need to
show strength has passed, Labour is raising good grounds for future opposition
to its foreign policy. For the moment, though, the war has ceased to monopolise
the headlines, and we can get back to domestic
politics. And so the Conservatives have started to oppose. And they are opposing
very well. They are winning the debate on health, education, transport and the
Constitution. In his recent big speech, Mr Duncan
Smith set out an agenda of opposition that he promises will be set out in detail
over the coming months. Before judging his ability as an opposition leader, we
should perhaps wait until the summer. By then, we
shall know if he is an effective leader, or simply another William Hague who got
lucky in the debate over Rose Addis. In naval terms, is he a Nelsonian
strategist who is about to sink a vastly superior enemy fleet,
or an amateur who, while sailing up and down the enemy line of battle, has
accidentally fired a red hot ball into the powder room of a first rater on the
other side? Only time can tell.
The Lack of Full Spectrum Opposition
To the second
objection, I will refer back to my original article. For at least the past 60
years, and perhaps for much longer, Conservatives in this country have accepted
the moral hegemony of their opponents, and
have sought moral legitimacy within the terms set by this hegemony. It would be
astonishing if the Conservative were to break wholly free of this and to start
opposing on their own terms. Their every instinct is to copy Labour to the
extent of becoming "New Tory" on a range is issues. This is
undesirable, of course, and we should do whatever we can to push them into a
firmer kind of opposition. But their core agenda is to settle the European
question on terms favourable to our national survival. If, in spite of our
efforts, they look set to compromise on every issue that is not part of their
core agenda, that is, regrettably,
no reason for us to withhold our support. We may be able to expand the core
agenda later on - or even replace it with another when the present one has been
achieved. But, given if will stand firm on the European issue, we must take the
Conservative Party as it is, not as we might like it to be.
The Euro
Referendum
The third
objection, I think, has a simple answer. If Mr Duncan Smith had answered the
question put to him with a refusal to accept the outcome of a referendum on the
Euro, that might have become an excuse
for the Government to enter the Eurozone without a referendum. After all, the
purpose of a referendum is to settle a matter by direct reference to the people,
and in a manner that withdraws it from further parliamentary debate. If the
Conservatives had broken this convention, having a referendum could have been
portrayed as an expensive waste of the people's time. If the Conservatives would
not be bound by the result of a referendum, I can easily imagine the Prime
Minister on television, explaining that the time for entry was now, and that it
was necessary to take advantage of the "right time" for entry before
conditions altered again. This is assuming, of course, that the Government is
still really interested in joining the Euro. I suspect that the argument over
joining has already been settled within the Government, and that the "right
time" will never be announced.
To answer the question as he did, Mr Duncan Smith left it open to reject the
outcome of a referendum. If the Government won a referendum on entry to the
Euro, and then lost a general election, it would be easy to denounce the
referendum as somehow rigged. Perhaps the question would have been biased.
Probably, the funding would have been stacked in favour of the yes campaign. Mr
Duncan Smith could get out of his
commitment without trouble by saying that he had a fair referendum in mind when
he said he would accept its outcome, and that this had not been a fair
referendum. Of course, if the referendum were to be run as fairly as humanly possible, and there were still a majority in favour of
joining, the country would already have been lost, and rejecting or accepting
the outcome would be equally pointless so far as things really
mattered.
The Case for
Conditional Support
I will repeat from
my original article. That the Conservative Party has started to oppose again
after five years of irrelevance is no reason for the rest of us to give up on
our own efforts. It would be disastrous for the United Kingdom Independence
Party to disband itself, or for the Democracy Movement to become a Conservative
front organisation directed from Central Office. I certainly have no intention
to shut down my
Candidlist project - little though it has done since the last general election.
It is the existence of these things that has helped move the Conservatives in
the right direction on Europe, and that threatens it with endless trouble
should it forget its duty. We must also bear in mind that one good month for an
opposition does not make a good opposition for the whole term of a Parliament.
Even so, it does seem reasonable to stop reviling the Party as the complete
waste of political space it was under William Hague, and to start regarding it
again as the most likely means of achieving our minimal objectives.
If I am wrong in this analysis, I shall feel rather gullible for a while, and
then go back to unwavering hostility. But it does not seem at the moment that I
am wrong. And if those of us in the Eurosceptic movement do not take advantage
of what may be the best chance we have had in over a generation of securing our
national independence, we shall lose much more than a little face.
Sean Gabb 28 Jan 2002
