Announcement

Followers of this blog will be aware that it had been mothballed it in June last year as I launched by new blog “Northern Ireland Centre Right.” The new blog was the focus of a campaign of persuasion, directed at the Conservative Party, that the Northern Ireland Regional Conservative Party should become an independent centre-right party which took no position on whether Northern Ireland should remain as part of the United Kingdom.

In the Autumn of this year, I became aware that the regional committee of the Northern Ireland Conservatives were campaigning hard with CCHQ for a new package which would enable them to field candidates at Assembly elections, including the election of 2011. I was persuaded that if they achieved their aim, I should suspend my Northern Ireland centre right campaign and campaign as a Conservative until after the Assembly elections. I made it clear, however, that the Conservatives had to be allowed to field candidates in the forthcoming 2011 election campaign. A promise to be allowed to field candidates in future elections was not acceptable, since it was clearly necessary, as a first step towards non-sectarian, non-communal politics, that the Conservative Party put some distance between itself and the UUP.

In November, it was looking very much as though the Committee would succeed in their aims. They had elicited favourable responses from very senior members of the party, including Owen Paterson. In preparation for that anticipated success, I decided to “dust down” the Tory Story NI blog. I still was not completely sure that they would succeed. Whilst the position was uncertain, I wrote posts simultaneously on Tory Story and NI Centre Right.

Two days ago, the Conservatives made their announcement that a new package had been agreed between the regional committee and CCHQ. The package included the right to campaign in Assembly Elections in the future but not the 2011 election. The Chairman indicated that it was operationally too late to field candidates in May. This looked to me like a “smoke screen” to conceal the fact that the committee had caved in to CCHQ pressure not to field candidates in the 2011 Assembly elections. In response to that, I asked one of the committee members to confirm or deny that the regional committee had made a commitment to CCHQ not to field Assembly candidates. The response I received was that they had not.

Since it appeared that it was now the regional committee that had made a decision not to field candidates, I held out a glimmer of hope that some local Associations could be persuaded by members to field their own candidates. I then learned that the Area committee had the power to block the fielding of candidates in its local area. As far as I was concerned, that marked the end of any hope that the Conservative Party would be fielding candidates in the 2011 Assembly elections.

Since there is no Assembly campaign to support, there is now no point in me continuing to write new posts on the Tory Story NI blog. As of today, I am announcing, once again, that there will be no further posts on that blog in the foreseeable future.

I will continue to write posts on Northern Ireland Centre Right until further notice. However, I will also be reflecting on what has happened and the political route most likely to be successful to achieve non-communal, normal left-right politics in Northern Ireland.  In particular, I will be considering, very carefully, whether there is any remote possibility that the critical mass of the Conservatives in Northern Ireland might come around to my way of thinking after 2015.

Conservatives prepare for UUP failure but they might still be hedging

At long last, agreement has finally been reached between the Northern Ireland Regional Conservatives and the Conservative leadership on a strategy for promoting Conservativism into the future.

The Party has issued the following announcement copied by email to the membership:

“The Conservative Party in Northern Ireland has committed itself to an ongoing programme of campaigning and development and will shortly move into a new campaign headquarters in Bangor, Co. Down. A full time member of staff will be based at the headquarters and one of the Party’s most senior campaign directors has been appointed to liaise with the Party in Northern Ireland.

The Party is committed to the development of progressive centre right politics which offer the electorate of Northern Ireland the opportunity to cast their votes for and participate directly with the national Government of the United Kingdom.  The Party will continue to review how Conservatives in Northern Ireland can play a full part in the Conservative Party as in every other part of the United Kingdom and senior Conservatives in Northern Ireland will work with the Board of the Party to develop that relationship.

Central to that development will be the Party’s desire to see Conservative Associations formed in every Northern Ireland constituency and an active programme of membership recruitment at a local level.

Conservative Party co-chairman Baroness Warsi said: “The Conservative Party in Northern Ireland has the unequivocal support of the Party nationally. Politics in Northern Ireland continues to evolve and we are determined to be at the heart of that evolution. Our approach will be one of active engagement – starting with the fielding of candidates in the Local Council elections in May.”

With that issue having been settled, the regional chairman of the Conservatives, Irwin Armstrong has now withdrawn his offer to resign. So is this the end of the uncertainty for Northern Ireland conservatives?

Jeffrey Peel’s headline suggests that the Conservative Party has “dumped” the UUP. In his statement on the question of fielding candidates at Assembly elections, Irwin Armstrong has said as follows:

“Members of our Executive have agreed that we would not now be able to properly contest the Assembly elections as we will not have the necessary infrastructure in place due to the events of recent months.”

The right to field Assembly (and presumably Parliamentary) candidates in the future is very important but there will be no further elections on the horizon (except the Euros) for four years.  Furthermore, you do not need an “infrastructure” to field a candidate. Ask an Independent. You just need to be able to register and pay the deposit.

There is a very strong case for the Conservatives putting up candidates, even in the limited time and space available. Nobody would suggest that a Conservative candidate would stand much chance of winning an Assembly seat but the act of fielding candidates would make the clearest possible statement to the electorate that the party no longer has any ties with the UUP.

Last November, Conservative leaders promised the UUP that they would not be fielding candidates.  The effect of this latest declaration is that the Conservatives will not be breaking that promise.  The UUP may now be in the equivalent of a bin liner but it could be taken out of it later.  It is much too early to say that it has been dumped.

Conservatives entitled to be proud of the Anglo-Irish Agreement

A little over two months ago marked the passing of the 25^th Anniversary of the Anglo-Irish Agreement. The anniversary resulted in posts by Brian Walker of Slugger O’Toole and by and other articles by Newspaper journalists across Ireland.

One of the curiosities of the Agreement is that the leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, James Molineaux was not consulted as the negotiations progressed. This is most odd. That the negotiations were taking place was not a state secret. From time to time, the fact of these discussions was made public. The SDLP was certainly consulted. In about September 1984, the Conservative Party, in edition No. 31 of their contact programme (“CPC 31”), published a detailed brief on the state of the negotiations at that time. It was available for sale in the Conservative Party bookshop for anybody who wanted to buy a copy. A link to this document can be located on the Conservative Party Archive website.

It is not as though the Ulster Unionists were sitting there doing nothing about the political problems either. In May 1984, they published their own document “the Way forward” (also for sale in the CPC bookshop). 

Perhaps when the Government archives are published in 3-4 years time, we will have a more precise picture on unionist consultation.

CPC 31 mentions the three proposals put forward by the Irish Government which were rejected by Mrs. Thatcher.  These were: a unitary state; a federal or confederal state; or joint authority. Dr. Fitzgerald, writing in the Irish times, recalled Mrs. Thatcher’s public reaction to those proposals in November 1984, some time after they were rejected.

On Open Unionism, in a post entitled “Reflections on the Anglo-Irish Agreement,” Turgon articulates the mainstream unionist view of the agreement. He recalls the sense of betrayal felt by unionists following the agreement. The Government would have known how Unionists would have reacted to the proposals, regardless of whether or not they had been consulted.  Why, then, did they risk alienating the great mass of the unionist population?

Better security was often cited as the main reason for it. Certainly, Mrs. Thatcher put a strong emphasis on the importance of better security but if that all there was to it, the agreement would not have taken place.

The 1981 hunger strikes proved to be a watershed in Northern Ireland’s political history. It launched the political career of Gerry Adams and later Sinn Fein representatives. This development worried the ROI Government, particularly.

The Catholic population in Northern Ireland was a large minority but barely represented in Parliament. In the 1983 General Election, the number of seats in Northern Ireland had been increased from 12 to 17. Still, the representation of the Catholic Population at Parliament was very small. Of those 17 seats, Gerry Adams of Sinn Fein had been elected as MP for West Belfast in place of Gerry Fitt. The only other non-unionist MP to be elected was John Hume in the constituency of Foyle.

The Government, rightly, perceived that there was a link between support for terrorism in the Catholic community and the lack of political representation. Looking for a solution to this problem remained a Government policy, despite the collapse of Sunningdale.

James Prior, Northern Ireland Secretary of State (1981-1984) summarised five principles which had to be observed, if there was political advance. These are set out in set out in contact programme document No. 31 at page 5: They were:

(i) The Constitutional position of Northern Ireland of Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom can only be changed freely given consent of its people. This is not a matter of law. Any other approach would be immoral, undemocratic and unworkable.

(ii) Not all of the political aspirations of the two communities can be completely or equally satisfied. There are two identities to be accommodated, in an environment where alienation exists on both sides.

(iii) The government and administration of the Province must ultimately remain a matter for Parliament. This means that there cannot be any Unionist or nationalist veto over the framework which Parliament prescribes.

(iv) The distinctive needs of Northern Ireland are best met through a devolved administration commanding support from both sides of the community. In the absence of agreement the Government will continue to administer the Province in the way it judges to be in the best interests of all the people and of the United Kingdom as a whole. The determination of the majority to maintain the Union must be upheld but this must be balanced by showing due regard for the minority’s interests in any internal arrangements.

(v) Geography, history and economic interest together with the identification many in Northern Ireland feel with Dublin call for a closer relationship between the United Kingdom and the Republic.

There was nothing wrong with the Government’s principles or motives for signing the Agreement.  As it turned out, the Agreement yielded very little in terms of security gains. However, the political gains are still underrated. The agreement, fully supported by the SDLP helped many Northern Irish nationalists to see the UK Government in a new light. The agreement also secured formal recognition, by a Republic of Ireland Government, that Northern Ireland was a part of the United Kingdom.

Today, the scars of the Anglo Irish Agreement are still felt by unionists. At the Ulster Unionist Party conference in December 2008, David Cameron felt compelled (albeit in an oblique manner) to make an apology for the signing of the Agreement.  Looking back on that speech, David Cameron’s apology had more to do with appeasing Ulster Unionists than taking responsibility for a political wrongdoing.  He should not have made that apology, unreservedly. 

The unfortunate thing is that many Northern Irish Unionists still do not seem to recognise their community’s failure to be fair to Catholics in the past was a major cause of the Anglo-Irish agreement coming into effect. In CPC 31, the Conservatives said this about a UUC proposal to turn the regional Assembly into a super council:

“The local Government was the sphere where most of the discrimination has tended to take place; matters such as housing and education are thus extremely sensitive.”

Back in 1985, power sharing seemed a long way off and Northern Ireland unionists were angry. They can not deny that the Agreement was a stepping stone to the Belfast Agreement.

In years to come, they will not be able to deny that the Belfast Agreement (and therefore the Anglo Irish Agreement) paved the way for peace, prosperity, a stronger union and a shared future for Northern Irish people.

Conservatives, meanwhile, should not be ashamed of the Anglo-Irish agreement. They have every reason to be proud of their government’s achievement at the time.

The future is bright but it certainly isn’t Orange

The Orange Order is back in the news again, following the announcement that it has a new Grand Master, Mr. Edward Stevenson. A typical Nationalist reaction to such news was “there goes the new head-honcho bigot”

We all need to be careful about our choice of words. All of us are imprinted with varying degrees of bigotry as we grow up. If your place of birth is Northern Ireland, the chances are that you have more religious bigotry to deal with than in most regions of Europe. Conquering one’s own bigotry, in relation to all forms of prejudice and intolerance, is just as much about developing an open mind as it is of being tolerant of the bigotry of others.

I do not have a problem with religious bigotry which is confined to doctrine or dogma. It follows that I don’t mind being told that I will “not be saved” or that I am following a “hellish path” if I abide by the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. It is all the sort of stuff which Protestants generally believe about Catholicism, whether or not they are members of the Orange Order. Where bigotry hurts is when it leads to inhumane behaviour such as avoidance, shunning, unkindness, intolerance, discrimination and, at the worst extreme, religious hatred.

On paper, at least, the Orange Order tells its people to show kindness and neighbourliness to Roman Catholics. Some Orangemen do just that and I am privileged to know some of them as my friends.

Unfortunately, these people do not represent the majority in that organisation. The majority of Orangemen are law-abiding citizens. They are also generally polite to Catholics and happy to do business with them. However, in their minds, Catholics are still “themuns." In their hearts they still can not go as far as completely trusting them.  They also find it very difficult to think non-communally. Real neighbourliness, which falls short of public duty, is hard to come by. This kind of thinking leads to discrimination and isolationism. It is not conducive to a shared future.

So far as Northern Irish politics is concerned, the Orange Order continues to dabble in politics, refuses to endorse political or religious pluralism and refuses to take responsibility for its role in past oppression of Catholics. At present, most UUP MLAs and most of its membership are still either members of the Orange order or very supportive of Orangism. The combined effects of these circumstances represent huge obstacles to progress for those Ulster Unionists who wish to move their party towards a more liberal position.

Tom Elliot has gone on record as saying that he wants the Orange Order to stay out of politics. Perhaps this is a recognition that an increasing number of Protestants are being turned off by the Orange Order and what it represents. Nonetheless, the appointment of a new Orange leader did not stop him from making a political gesture of ingratiation.

Meanwhile, the new leader of the Orange Order, Mr. Stevenson, did not disappoint his brethren when it came to stirring the pot. Outside Ballykelly hall, Mr. Stevenson announced that he would not be talking to Sinn Fein or the Parades Commission or attending GAA matches. There was nothing new in that. This was a leader of an intolerant organisation practising what it preaches.

The Conservative Party, if it has any ambition left in Northern Ireland politics, should avoid any association with Orangism. Unfortunately, the present link up with the UUP puts in jeopardy the Conservative Party’s non-sectarian credentials (more about that in a future post).

Meanwhile, the Orange Order’s declining membership roll can only be a good thing for Northern Ireland politics. The future is bright but it certainly is not Orange.

CCHQ continue to leave Northern Ireland Conservatives out in the cold

Firstly, I would like to wish everybody who follows this blog a warm and happy new year.

I have noticed that political bloggers, from time to time, write posts about sport without there being any political context. I am a lover of cricket so I’m going to have a one-off crow. I have been hooked on the Ashes cricket series down under between England and Australia. To see Australia being so comprehensively beaten, in a sport which they have dominated since the late 1980s, is a joy to behold. The enjoyment of it has kept me warm during this appalling period of freezing weather, burst pipes and water shortages.

For the Conservatives in Northern Ireland, there is still a freeze in their relationship with CCHQ. From what I have been told by Conservatives, much of the blame for the situation rests with Jonathan Caine, a former advisor to the Conservative Party on Northern Ireland and now a special advisor to the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.

Mr. Caine has a reputation, within the Conservative Party, as a person with very considerable experience of Northern Ireland political affairs. He is well read on the politics and history of Northern Ireland, as you would expect. I respect his reputation as a learned man.

Mr. Caine has also been portrayed as somebody who has lost his sense of independent judgment because of his close sympathy towards the UUP. I am told that he still does not understand Northern Ireland because he does not live here.

I don’t know, exactly, to what extent, Mr. Caine was pivotal in the decision to prevent Northern Ireland Conservatives from fielding candidates at Assembly Elections. For the moment, I make two observations.

Firstly, the recent decision by CCHQ to continue their support for the UUP, at the expense of Northern Ireland Conservatives is misconceived in its entirety. The UUP have nothing to offer the Conservative Party, in the short or medium-term future, in terms of winning Northern Ireland Parliamentary seats.

Secondly, I agree with the contention that you can not know Northern Ireland unless you have lived here. I have lived in Northern Ireland for 12 years. Before that, I had lived in England and the Republic of Ireland. For all the Newspapers, political and history books that I have studied and read about Ireland, nothing was as educational as living amongst Northern Irish people.

A sense betrayal has festered amongst Northern Ireland Conservatives for the last month. CCHQ, if it is making a decision that NI Conservatives do not like, should be going out of their way to keep their membership on board. Instead, they have been completely insensitive and left them isolated. That is no way to run a political party. To borrow an old English metaphor, ‘it just isn’t cricket’.

The powerful thoughts of a Scottish Tory may shed some light on the Northern Ireland problem

No Conservative needs to be reminded that the Conservative Party has a problem with Scotland.

Since before the General Election, I have followed what bloggers and politicians have been saying about the causes of the problem and what to do about it but always bearing in mind that the problems of Scotland and Northern Ireland are not the same. Picking out the features of the Scottish problem and applying those parts of it, which are relevant to the Northern Ireland problem is not a straightforward exercise. The exercise is an important one, nevertheless. Back in June, I wrote my first post on this subject.

A few weeks ago, the Sanderson report was completed. Since I published a post in reaction to media commentary, I have had an opportunity to read the full report. Despite the report’s very hard-hitting observations on party organisation and structure, I could not help feeling that the report fell short of proper analysis on the prospects for an Independent Scottish Party.

I am now glad to say that another Conservative with far more knowledge of this subject than me has written a post, which cuts very deep and makes a case to answer for an independent party. He is Blair Murray and his post has been published on Conservative Home.

Murray makes some important observations about where ‘would be’ tories have parked their vote:

“The fact is that there are many centre-Right voters in Scotland who do not vote Tory. In rural areas, particularly in the Highlands, they vote Lib Dem. In the North-East and in urban areas many vote SNP. Indeed, canvassing in previous elections it became clear to me that many SNP supporters would prefer lower taxes, incentives for business and less government regulation. Some of these voters were even ambivalent towards the SNP’s central goal of independence. It is these voters, to the right of Scottish Labour on economic arguments, that we must win in the future.”

Murray also makes very important points relating to the history of the Scottish Unionist Party leading up to the merger with the Conservatives in 1965. An important Scottish political identity had effectively been killed. Murray makes this very important observation about the branding and identity of political parties in Scotland before the merger:

“What all of these have in common is the deliberate avoidance of the term ‘Conservative’, which had always been associated with the English party. The effect of the 1965 merger should be clear for all to see.”

Murray also defends the proposal to give Holyrood greater fiscal autonomy and argues against those who say that it is more likely to lead to Scottish independence.

I totally agree. A look at history might help to understand the Scottish psyche a little better. The Scots were not conquered by England. The first Unionist was a Scot. Somewhere buried deeply in the Scottish psyche is a desire to be seen as having parity with the English.

Murray concludes:

“All the evidence shows that Scots feel more Scottish than British. Incidentally, the evidence also shows that the English feel increasingly English rather than British. This does not for a moment mean that those who feel more Scottish or more English want the UK to split. Most of us are comfortable with overlapping identities. I, like most Conservatives, am a passionate supporter of the Union. And many of those voters in Scotland who feel more Scottish than British would vote for a party of the centre-Right. They would vote for a party supportive of enterprise and social stability, emphasising tradition and responsibilities as well as rights. At the moment they don’t. Only by becoming like those voters – proudly Scottish but supportive of the UK – will the Scottish Conservatives become a success.”

Identity is a key problem in Northern Ireland too. I make no bones about the fact that it is not easy to persuade a voter who is a unionist to make a journey which leaves behind the comfort zone of a party with a unionist identity. Just reading the exchanges that I have had on this blog with Conservative officials bears that out.  It will also be just as difficult to persuade Nationalists to leave the comfort zone of a party with a nationalist identity.

There are three powerful arguments in response to that which lend weight to the theory that the Northern Ireland Centre Right campaign is the right one to break down this paradox. Firstly, a party which is neutral on the constitutional position shortens that journey by half. Secondly, the overwhelming majority of Northern Irish people want an end to sectarianism. Thirdly, a Conservative Regional party which makes that journey from its present position would send a very inspiring powerful signal of leadership to the Northern Irish people.

NI Centre Right Campaign strengthened by events of the last week

Child abuse comes in many forms. Nearly all child abuse falls into one of three categories: neglect, physical harm and emotional abuse. All forms of abuse by a parent or carer involve some form of emotional abuse.

Not all child abuse by Parents is driven by wickedness or selfishness. Sometimes, the root cause of child abuse is illness by the parents or parents simply not being able to cope.

If the abuse is severe enough, it falls into the category of ‘significant harm.’ If a child is suffering, or likely to suffer, significant harm, the child protection authorities are obliged to intervene. In the worst of these cases, if the parents show no sign of wanting or being capable of providing a suitable upbringing for the child, the child will go into care. In exceptional cases, more likely with infants, the authorities will place the child for adoption. Metaphorically speaking, “child abuse” has occurred in the Conservative and Unionist family.

The Conservative Party is more than 300 years old. The Orange Order is more than 200 years old. In the earlier years of Orangism, these two organisations did not like each other. Relations were at their lowest ebb when, in 1829, legislation for Catholic Emancipation was passed under a Tory Government. However, they had one thing in common. They were unionists. The rise of the Parnellites brought them into a relationship.

In 1905, the Ulster Unionist Party (the UUP) was born. The UUP was a bastard child of the Conservative Party. The Other parent was the Orange Order. From the time of that birth, the Conservative Party were content to leave the care and upbringing of the UUP to the Orange Order whilst continuing to acknowledge it as its child.

The Orange Order was a bad parent. It engendered an attitude of antipathy and mistrust towards Catholics. The UUP became papaphobic, just like its Orange mother. Its Conservative father neglected it by not being involved in its upbringing. The UUP became a bully but its Conservative father, proud to acknowledge it when they met in the UK Parliament, could not see that it was doing anything wrong.

The UUP then got into trouble. When the civil rights riots broke out, the Conservatives were obliged to take some responsibility. When the Conservative father asked the UUP to accept some Sunningdale treatment, its mother objected. For a short period, the UUP was torn between the wishes of its mother and its father. Papaphobia was still a dominating influence. Inevitably, the UUP rejected Sunningdale. Like a sulking teenager, the UUP stopped talking to its father. The father attempted to talk sense with its son but to no avail. The combined effect of the political power vacuum and the deteriorating security situation led the father to signing the Anglo Irish Agreement. This caused so much anger that the UUP cut off all remaining ties with its father.

Shortly afterwards, the Conservative Party fathered another child. This child was a legitimate non-sectarian daughter. The Northern Ireland Conservatives had been born. For a short time in its early life, this child was encouraged to survive and thrive but soon suffered from neglect. It was hungry and undernourished. Because it achieved nothing, it was ignored by its father. Nonetheless, the daughter was dutiful and did what it was told by its father.

The UUP’s mother started to become frail and weak, suffering from a debilitating long-term illness which will eventually lead to its death – secularism. With the mother’s influence declining, the UUP drifted slowly towards moderation and signed the Belfast Agreement. When the Northern Ireland Conservatives saw that its father approved this development, it became jealous. In a desperate attempt to get its father’s attention, it opposed it. Still the Conservative Party ignored its daughter.

The UUP, having been badly beaten by an ever strengthening DUP, sought to get back on terms with its father. Reconciliation then occurred. However, the father wanted the UUP to be locked permanently into the family. The UUP was asked to enter into a marriage with the Northern Ireland Conservatives. The marriage proposal was rejected. Instead, an agreement was made that they live together. The result of this relationship was the birth of UCUNF.

The relationship between the UUP and the Northern Ireland Conservatives did not work out and the UCUNF child was abused by the UUP when it decided to equivocate over possible candidate deals with the DUP and internal wrangles over candidate selection resulting in crucial delay. Going into the 2010 General election, a sole unionist candidate was selected for Fermanagh and South Tyrone. Northern Ireland Conservatives were traumatised. The UCUNF child, already unhealthy going into the 2010 General Election, had been severely abused by its father and grandfather.

The UCUNF infant later died. The UUP walked away from its relationship with the NI Conservatives and told its father that it wanted the NI Conservatives out of the house.   The Northern Ireland Conservatives did not want the relationship to continue either.   The UUP’s rejection of a continuation of the link, or any future election pact, gave rise to confidence of Northern Ireland Conservatives that it would, at last, receive the support it deserved from its father.  The father had to choose between one of its children to decide who would represent National policy in Northern Ireland. In the end, a parent’s selfishness played a crucial part in the decision.

This brings me to the end of this sorry mythical tale. I apologise for the very few historical distortions which have appeared. It is sometimes appropriate to use a little bit of artistic licence to illustrate an important point.

The Northern Ireland Conservatives have been rejected, in my opinion, to a point where it is not possible for them to continue as a regional branch of the main Conservative Party. The position of trust and confidence is not something that is capable of being restored.

Alex Kane likens this position to something akin to inevitable political infanticide. I completely agree. That being the case, there is only one way for the Northern Ireland Conservatives to go. It should become an independent party. An independent party needs a political niche. That niche is a centre-right party which would take no position if there was a referendum on the future of Northern Ireland. Admittedly, there may still be a battle of persuasion ahead in relation to that last point.

As a lifelong Conservative supporter, I deeply regret what has happened. However, every cloud has a silver lining. The civilised campaign that I was conducting was always likely to be difficult, so long as there was such a strong attachment between local conservatives and the main party. With the severe weakening of that attachment, there is no doubt that the Northern Ireland Centre-Right campaign has been strengthened.

In time, as Northern Ireland Conservatives lick their wounds, they may well conclude that the events of the last few days were all for the best.

Working together

What a speech! Well, I would say that wouldn’t I? There is no way that a neutral would not have been moved by it. It had a powerful theme running through it. It had vibrancy. It was passionate. It was patriotic. It was inspiring. It was Churchillian.

We were reminded, as we have been throughout the conference, that the Liberal Democrats are playing their part. It is an example to everybody that there are times when we have to put adversarial politics to one side to build alliances in the National Interest. That alliance is, in itself, a source of inspiration.

I could say a lot of more specific things about the speech. I will leave the newspapers with the detail. What I would like to get across is the power of the theme.  It was a call to everybody in the Country to take their share of strain and pain.  In a nutshell, we are all being told that we have a contribution to make to a better, more cohesive, more prosperous society.  We have to work hard but there is a reward to look forward to and we will have prevented an even bigger mess for the next generation.

We should be working together.   Contrast Martin McGuiness.  Observe his attitude towards spending cuts and his dismissive attitude towards Owen Paterson’s invitation to consider the costs of segregation.

There is no sense in McGuinness’s mind that the economic pain should be shared, even though the Nation which he covets we should join is suffering much greater pain. There is no willingness to contribute any alternative thinking. There does not seem to be any desire, whatsoever, to engender a cross-community spirit into the Northern Irish people. No, he wants to retain their selfish “ourselves alone” detachment.  His country doesn’t need him!

We know that Sinn Fein is an ultra socialist party. If they had been in control of raising taxes and borrowing money, we know that we would be Greece.  Still, they do bear much of the responsibility for our present economic ills in Northern Ireland.   A public sector which represents 77% of Northern Ireland’s GDP is their legacy.  You would think they would want to do something useful to expunge the memory of it.

They now have elected politicians. They are there to do a job. People expect that of them. If they are not prepared to rise to the plate and take some responsibility, there is only one justified way forward for Sinn Fein politicians.  Resign.

Does the Conservative Party have an ideology

I have not made up my mind about whether the election of Ed Milliband as Labour leader was a good or a bad development for the Conservative Party.  Most of the Newspaper journalists seem to think it was a good thing.  I have to admit that I was unprepared for Ed Milliband’s victory.  I am playing “catch up” in my quest to become informed about him.  The only observation that I can make is that his victory was a great achievement by any standard.

Ed Milliband’s victory has triggered off an interesting debate in The Times about whether or not the Conservative Party has an ideology.

In his recent book “The Third Man,” Peter Mandelson suggested that David Cameron did not have an ideology.

“He has values but he doesn’t have a set of fixed, political beliefs that flow from a particular political outlook or philosophy,” said Mandelson.

There are some conservatives who would probably agree with that.  Back in April Bob Tyrell of the BBC wrote a piece “Is British Politics Ideology Free?”  He observed that this impression might easily be conveyed since so much politics is fought on the centre ground.  Citing an interesting observation by David Willetts, then shadow Educations spokesman, he wrote:

David Willetts is the Conservative’s shadow education secretary and one of the party’s leading thinkers.

He describes the political debate today as rather like a contest between different blends of coffee or whisky – “who’s got the better blend of a competitive economy and social justice and community.”

Far from regretting the absence of big ideological clashes he also welcomes the fact that politics is no longer a case of “one party that solely believes in a modern market economy and doesn’t understand society and the other party that is solely committed to some sense of social obligation to others and doesn’t understand a market economy.”

However, the parties have to come from somewhere.  Their rhetoric gives them away and even if pragmatism is the final force guiding policymaking, it is ideology which drives the debate.  As Tyrell concludes:

“In that sense all major parties will agree what matters. What works is where the disagreements will be, and there is a chance these could be bitter and, dare we say it, ideological.”

Peter Mandelson does not appear to have taken the same view about the Conservative Party as he did about David Cameron.  Nor, it seems, does Tony Blair who recently ‘advised’ David Cameron to abandon ideological focus.

However, there are some, including Conservatives who would not accept that the party has an ideology at all.  In his article for The Times published 1^st October 2010, Phillip Collins wrote: 

“As the conservative philosopher Michael Oakeshott said, allegiance is more about disposition than it is about ideology. The prejudice drives the politics, not vice versa.”

Collins then set out his view as to how the Labour Party viewed Conservative ideals.

“For them, politics is a morality play in which good ideas clash with bad. That is why Labour is a party of heresy-hunters, chasing out the traitors.”

Collins examined Ed Milliband’s first major party conference speech since becoming leader.  He uses the theme of spending cuts to demonstrate that Labour see themselves in some sort of permanent ideological struggle with the Conservatives.  Central to this apparent Labour view is the Conservatives’ apparent lust to reduce the size of the state.

“His [Ed Milliband’s] understanding of political method is that you declare your convictions and wait for the public to rally round. Labour MPs lined up in Manchester to say, in effect, the same thing: that, deep down, underneath that involuntary act of voting Tory, the public share Labour values. There is no act of persuasion needed. The reason that Labour lost is that it wasn’t really Labour enough.

This has another consequence. It means that Labour people get Conservatives wrong. Labour people take the ideological relish of the Tories for granted. They think the Conservative Party will gather in Birmingham next week to concoct a deliberate plan to ruin the public sector.”

He uses history to suggest that the Conservative Party was never a party driven by any ideology.

“Look, in other words, at what they do, not what they say. In 1867 Disraeli cynically brought down Gladstone’s Parliamentary Reform Bill. A year later Disraeli himself introduced a more radical version of the Bill he had opposed, ostensibly in principle. The humane social legislation that came after was an explicit thank you to his new class of supporters. Some good got done, but it didn’t start with a blueprint.”

If you had read my recent post on political tectonic plates, you could be forgiven for thinking that the Conservative Party was just a party of power retained to defend the interests of the better off.  Nobody would argue that the party has evolved into a completely different political being from what it was 300 years ago and has acquired many standing values in that time.  However, not everybody, least of all Peter Mandelson, would accept that simply having a set of values amounts to having an ideology.  Once again, I quote from “The Third Way as set out in Conservative Home

He [David Cameron] has values but he doesn’t have a set of fixed, political beliefs that flow from a particular political outlook or philosophy.

“I mean, what is his view of the role of government or the State or markets? Does he really believe, as the ‘Big Society’ implied, that government should just get out of the way and let people organise their schools and hospitals as they wish?

Mandelson may well have misunderstood David Cameron.  He also seems to have been unawared of the fact that the ‘Big Society’ theme is not a particularly new strand of Conservative (or indeed Liberal) thinking.  Edmund Burke (18^th century lawyer and politician) said:

“Whatever each man can do separately do, without trespassing on others, he has a right to do for himself; and he has a right to a far portion of all which society, with all its combinations of skill and force, can do in his favour”

If there is a system of ideas which links the 19^th century to present day conservativism, it is the belief that government is at its best if it governs in a way in which the population, having regard to human nature, is most likely to further its best interests and that of the nation.  Perhaps that sounds vague and populist.  It translates into a recognition that Government should regulate society in such a way that it builds upon what is good, interferes as little as possible, and allows people to thrive.  It is a thread which runs through the expressions of all of the great definers of Conservative thought, including Edmund Burke, Sir Robert Peel and Benjamin D’Israeli.  

The rise of Socialism drove the Conservative Party to become the guardians of capitalism.  Once again, it was the recognition of how human nature works which gave expression to the economic aspects of Conservative philosophical thinking.  The state of human nature was such that greater wealth creation and thus national prosperity could only thrive under capitalism.  This is now at the core of Conservative Ideology.  Yes, there have been other strains of Conservativism, including one-nation conservativism, thatcherism and progressive conservativism but the core of Conservativism is about getting the best out of people, including their willingness to help others, through capitalism.

Matthew Paris, writing for The Times on October 2^nd 2010 does not agree with Phillip Collins.  In his article, he sets out two strands of Conservative Ideology.  One is ‘the pessimistic’ which accepts the darker, selfish side of human nature.  The other is ‘the optimistic’ which promotes the human virtues of kindness and responsibility.  He sets out why he believes that conservatives have been in denial about their ideology.  He concludes by suggesting, that there is growing feeling amongst the population, that there is something wrong with “gross” inequality and proposes that the Conservatives will need to refine their ideology in the direction of greater equality to make it fit for the 21^st Century:

“Conservatism’s a teaching taught so early that most Tories, having imbibed the doctrine with their mother’s milk, don’t even realise they have a doctrine; they think it’s just common sense, as Hindus think reincarnation is common sense. Tories are as unconscious of their ideology as are most Englishmen of their sense of nationhood.

But Conservatives have a philosophy as muscular as it is submarine: an anchor Tories may need to hold them in bad times, if not in good.

For, odd as it may sound, these are good times for Conservative politics. Labour’s near-bankrupting of Britain seems to have made their case for them. The sun shines on the Tory prescription for government. Conservatives can lean on the easy argument for rolling back the State: that the money has run out. They needn’t try our patience with Aristotle, Locke, Smith, Hume, Mill, Burke, Ayn Rand and the philosophical case for self-help.

Your instinctive Conservative is anyway uncomfortable with abstractions (Phil’s right about that) and becomes nervous when pointy-heads speak of ethical egoism, benevolent capitalism … or anything ending in -ism. But, just as Molière’s Bourgeois Gentleman had been speaking prose all his life without knowing it, your average Tory has had an -ism all his life without knowing it. He might be surprised to know he believes in the galvanising power of inequality, in the charitable instinct, in fear, in hunger and (within limits) in greed. He might not acknowledge that he thinks it human nature to do as little as we can get away with. Hardened into words, these ideas unsettle him. “Sorry, the cupboard’s bare” is so much easier. Which of us cannot remember the parental “can’t afford it” as the knockdown answer to the child’s “why not?” Other, better reasons were left unvoiced.

Unvoiced by most natural Conservatives is a slew of arguments about governance, most of them anchored in a recognisable if sloppily expressed idea of human nature.

In calling this idea pessimistic, our critics (I speak as a Conservative) correctly describe half the truth. We do see self-interest (and those extensions of self: family and community) as a more reliable motivator than any urge to improve humanity generally. We do see sharp limits to the possibilities of altruism, except in palpable, time-limited emergencies. We do believe that too much economic security dulls the individual’s edge. We don’t believe that anything like equality of outcome between all citizens is either achievable or desirable.

We don’t think the possibility of success can have useful meaning without the possibility of failure; that “ourselves” can signify much except as distinguished from “others”. We cannot conceive of virtue in the absence of vice; of honour without stigma; or of hope without fear. We are suspicious of political theologies that censor the dark side from their lexicon, or deny that if success needs beacons then so does failure. We doubt you can eat your cake and have it afterwards.

So, yes, there’s a strong strand of pessimism in Conservative ideology. A tremendous compensating optimism, though, has been the unspoken strand. Conservatives think human beings, all human beings, can be very strong. We think people underestimate their potential. We think individuals have great and often untapped reserves of kindness and duty to those people they adopt as their personal responsibility: the more direct the link, the stronger the devotion.

This is the other half of the truth about Tory thinking. It has been David Cameron’s enormous contribution to our party’s idea of itself, not just to say this, but to exemplify it personally. It was with this optimism that he made his distinctive start. But the optimistic side of Conservative doctrine is now vulnerable to the “cupboard’s bare” sentiment gripping Britain.

The party should take care. Open-handed may be bad, but big-hearted is still good, and it can be no coincidence that the only part of Ed Miliband’s Manchester address to Labour last week that really took wing was his closing passage, about optimism. He spoke to a sense of what’s missing.

Of course the Tory Big Society idea is aimed at precisely this lack. The concept’s making headway and must be pushed all the harder at Birmingham this week. But it suffers from being easily (if not always fairly) linked to spending cuts.

Big heart cannot in today’s climate mean deep pocket, so policy proposals must be without cost to the Exchequer. Here are two. Conservative doctrine leaves unanswered some aching questions, and they are linked. Nobody really thinks it fair or necessary that wages at the bottom in Britain are so incredibly far from those at the top. Who at a conference hotel can compare what the anxious, worn-looking woman who comes in to clean the room is earning per hour with what the guest or hotel boss earns and still insist that free-market economics depends on the scale (as opposed to the fact) of difference?

And though Conservatives believe fiercely in inequality of outcome, most of us feel uncomfortable about gross inequalities in the situations from which young people start.

It follows (I submit) that the inquiry Mr Cameron has asked Will Hutton to conduct into wage differentials is the more important because it touches a spot where Conservatives should be very sensitive. And Michael Gove’s free-schools plan, which incorporates a premium to follow disadvantaged children, will touch, unless generous, just as raw a nerve.

Why not tax employers who let wage differentials sprawl? Why not skew pupil premiums dramatically towards the poor? Why not make fee-paying schools’ VAT-exemption depend on what proportion of scholarship students they take from non-fee-paying families? Would one in four be so shocking?

For the coalition Cabinet, big heart and tight wallet will not be easy to square; but for the integrity and reputation of the Conservative Party’s 21st-century ideology, the attempt is critical. Ideology matters. “The cupboard’s bare” is not enough.

Matthew Paris’s conclusion is certainly thought-provoking.  A new centre-right party for Northern Ireland would, of course, develop its brand of ideology which links it to the specialist requirements of the Northern Ireland population.  As a starting point, though, I commend Paris’s thinking

Campaign for a New Northern Ireland Centre-Right Party begins

I was not the first blogger to advocate the creation of a new non-designated centre-right political party for Northern Ireland and I am now not the last.

I have launched my own campaign for the Northern Ireland regional branch of the Conservative Party to be converted into this new centre-right party with a new name.  The focus of this campaign is set out at my new blog.

All debate on this subject (whether supportive or hostile) is welcome and I invite anybody who has an opinion on the subject to comment on the new blog.