The Conservative Party Conference was almost pornographic with its passion for Margaret Thatcher, says Brian Reade, but clinging to the memory of a dead leader while in total denial of its disastrous recent past, speaks volumes
Lady Gaga mesmerised a sellout 23,000 crowd with her talent and energy at the Manchester Co-op Live Arena this week. Three miles away, in an arena devoid of all energy and life, a different lady who went gaga many years ago had the sparse crowd pining for the past.
Lady Thatcher haunted this year’s funereal Tory conference like a mocking ghost. At the entrance stood three glass cages housing her power suits, there was a giant mosaic of her face, and a Thatcher Theatre. Stalls were selling Thatcher books, mugs, tea towels and Christmas baubles, and virtually every speaker made a teary-eyed reference to her glory days.
The love-in was almost pornographic. Although with Thatcher being dead for 12 years it was purely necrophilia porn.
The speeches were dire. Summed up by Chris Philp ’s attempts at stand-up comedy which made the faces of the watching few cringe so hard they were almost sucked inside out. The messaging was even direr, summed up by misspelling Britain as “Britian” on their complementary chocolate bars.
Panicked by catastrophic polling that puts them down with the Lib Dems, shadow ministers spewed out a slew of unworkable, unfunded policies that will never see the light of day. Pledges to take down liberal judges, end foreign aid and curb human rights, send hit squads into immigrants’ homes to deport 750,000 of them to destinations unknown and decimate the public sector.
They’ve gone from being disciples of one mad-haired narcissist in Boris Johnson to another in Donald Trump. Yet the few outside the hall who were listening must have been asking themselves “you were in power for 14 years, leaving a diminished country with zero growth and broken public services, so why didn’t you implement these wonder cures then?”
They’re still talking about “taking our country back”. But back to when – 2010 when they got into bed with the Lib Dems and crippled us with austerity? Or 2016 and their disastrous Brexit? Covid days when they laughed in the nation’s face by holding lockdown party after lockdown party? Or 2022 when Liz Truss crashed the economy off a cliff?
The only words that will be remembered from this week came from the new party leader favourite, repugnant opportunist Robert Jenrick, who tried to make political capital out of a visit to Handsworth in Birmingham by claiming that he “didn’t see another white face”.
Meaning when Kemi Badenoch’s Poundland Nigel Farage act tanks completely, she’ll be replaced by a Poundland Enoch Powell. And with councillors and MPs deserting the sinking ship in droves, Enoch will land that job soon. And then they’ll be finished. Deservedly so.
Because if a party is in total denial of its disastrous recent past, preferring instead to cling to the memory of a dead leader whose radical ideology divided the country four decades ago, then it’s not just in big trouble, it deserves to be. For their stupidity, arrogance and shameless lying, these Tories face being booted into the dustbin of history.
And tellingly, many of their own diehard activists know this, which is why, to draw on Lady Gaga, they’re realising they’re in a Bad Romance and falling into the arms of Nigel Farage. And as Oscar Wilde said of the death of Little Nell, you’d have to have a heart of stone not to cry tears… of laughter.
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