The Conservative Party is Loving Opposition - Which is Exactly Why They Will Stay There
"We need to end what I call 'Governmentitis'" Kemi Badenoch told her party conference this week.
Urging them to abandon "the belief that we're going to be in Government very soon" Badenoch called on them to instead embrace the freedom and opportunity of opposition.
"I'm sad to be in opposition, but there's a part of me that's excited…" Badenoch told the conference during her closing speech on Wednesday.
"We are going to have fun".
She wasn't kidding.
Whether it was suggesting that the level of maternity pay women receive is "excessive", attacking the minimum wage, or calling on tens of thousands of civil servants to be thrown into jail, the former Business Secretary clearly enjoyed her newfound freedom this week more than most.
She wasn't the only one. In conference bars and meeting rooms, Conservative MPs and activists all queued up to luxuriate in the liberty of losing all power and responsibility.
At fringe meeting after meeting, panelists celebrated the new Labour government's difficulties, while dismissing their own recent downfall as simply being the result of having "talked right but governed left".
The luxury of this argument is that it allows the party to continue saying and doing all of the things that helped get them into opposition in the first place.
Whether its demanding massive tax cuts at a time when public services are literally falling apart, lashing out at young people at a time when the average age of a Conservative voter has risen to the mid sixties, or doubling down on the same anti-immigrant rhetoric which triggered the rise of Reform, the Conservative party seems intent on digging itself even further into its own electoral hole.
Related reading: Conservative Frontrunner Robert Jenrick Plans to 'Win a Culture War' with Young People
A 'Natural' Return to Government?
This complacency has only been helped by the political difficulties Keir Starmer's Government has quickly got itself into.
Rachel Reeves' decision to cut the winter fuel allowance and the subsequent Labour donations scandal have both helped to lure Conservative members into the dangerous belief that they can expect to be back in Government in just a few years time.
As defeated leadership candidate Mel Stride told one meeting, the party could now expect for voters to "naturally" return to the party over the coming months and years.
This idea has been buoyed by the belief among some Conservatives in the inherent wickedness of their opponents.
"Labour are in and everyone can see that they're the bad guys and we're the good guys", Kemi Badenoch told one fringe event, before later accusing the left of "stealthily poisoning our society".
Yet while, Labour's ratings may have plunged since the general election, there is little sign of voters turning back to the Conservative party instead.
And despite the huge crowds of Conservative activists that gathered to cheer on their former leader Liz Truss this week, the reality is that outside the steel wire of the conference boundaries, she is still widely reviled.
Yet rather than face up to these stark realities and apologise to voters for the economic and social damage they have done to the country, the past week has shown a party still heavily stuck in denial.
And far from looking like a party poised to regain power, the Conservatives now look much more likely to head in the complete opposite direction instead.
Not everyone in the party is blind to this risk. As the former Conservative adviser Tim Montgomerie warned his colleagues "we shouldn't assume this is the bottom. The bottom is zero."
And as another former Conservative adviser told another fringe meeting this week, "We cannot for one second convince ourselves that we're not loathed. We are. And we haven't done any of the necessary steps [to turn things around]".
Related reading: Deplatformed: Nigel Farage's Reform Bans Byline Times from their Party Conference
Urging them to abandon "the belief that we're going to be in Government very soon" Badenoch called on them to instead embrace the freedom and opportunity of opposition.
"I'm sad to be in opposition, but there's a part of me that's excited…" Badenoch told the conference during her closing speech on Wednesday.
"We are going to have fun".
She wasn't kidding.
Whether it was suggesting that the level of maternity pay women receive is "excessive", attacking the minimum wage, or calling on tens of thousands of civil servants to be thrown into jail, the former Business Secretary clearly enjoyed her newfound freedom this week more than most.
She wasn't the only one. In conference bars and meeting rooms, Conservative MPs and activists all queued up to luxuriate in the liberty of losing all power and responsibility.
At fringe meeting after meeting, panelists celebrated the new Labour government's difficulties, while dismissing their own recent downfall as simply being the result of having "talked right but governed left".
The luxury of this argument is that it allows the party to continue saying and doing all of the things that helped get them into opposition in the first place.
Whether its demanding massive tax cuts at a time when public services are literally falling apart, lashing out at young people at a time when the average age of a Conservative voter has risen to the mid sixties, or doubling down on the same anti-immigrant rhetoric which triggered the rise of Reform, the Conservative party seems intent on digging itself even further into its own electoral hole.
Related reading: Conservative Frontrunner Robert Jenrick Plans to 'Win a Culture War' with Young People
A 'Natural' Return to Government?
This complacency has only been helped by the political difficulties Keir Starmer's Government has quickly got itself into.
Rachel Reeves' decision to cut the winter fuel allowance and the subsequent Labour donations scandal have both helped to lure Conservative members into the dangerous belief that they can expect to be back in Government in just a few years time.
As defeated leadership candidate Mel Stride told one meeting, the party could now expect for voters to "naturally" return to the party over the coming months and years.
This idea has been buoyed by the belief among some Conservatives in the inherent wickedness of their opponents.
"Labour are in and everyone can see that they're the bad guys and we're the good guys", Kemi Badenoch told one fringe event, before later accusing the left of "stealthily poisoning our society".
Yet while, Labour's ratings may have plunged since the general election, there is little sign of voters turning back to the Conservative party instead.
And despite the huge crowds of Conservative activists that gathered to cheer on their former leader Liz Truss this week, the reality is that outside the steel wire of the conference boundaries, she is still widely reviled.
Yet rather than face up to these stark realities and apologise to voters for the economic and social damage they have done to the country, the past week has shown a party still heavily stuck in denial.
And far from looking like a party poised to regain power, the Conservatives now look much more likely to head in the complete opposite direction instead.
Not everyone in the party is blind to this risk. As the former Conservative adviser Tim Montgomerie warned his colleagues "we shouldn't assume this is the bottom. The bottom is zero."
And as another former Conservative adviser told another fringe meeting this week, "We cannot for one second convince ourselves that we're not loathed. We are. And we haven't done any of the necessary steps [to turn things around]".
Related reading: Deplatformed: Nigel Farage's Reform Bans Byline Times from their Party Conference
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