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- [00:16]
A
Hello and welcome to the Hot Seat. We're here with Professor Tony Travers to discuss the 2017 party political conference season. Thanks for joining us, Tony, can you briefly explain what the purpose of the party political conference is? Are they designed to appeal to the party members or voters?
- [00:34]
B
Well, it's a really interesting question this, because I think for many, many years, and conferences have gone on now for decades, they were an opportunity for activists in local constituencies, people who worked in local government and so on, for the political parties, possibly as members of councils and so on, to. To meet with the party leadership, to have debates and real debates in the past with people heckling from the floor and making policy and all of that. And it was a real thing. In the last 20 or so years, I think party conferences have become manicured. We can't have dissent in the halls. And they're really designed for the party to project an image of, you know, we're all together, we've got a plan for the future, whatever it is. And this year in particular, I think for the Conservatives, it was an attempt to relaunch Theresa May, to show that the government had strong leadership and that there was a plan for Brexit and everything else. So I do think the party conferences have changed entirely in purpose. And by the way, I mean, you know, they are such strange things to go to. I mean, the LSE holds fringe event at both the Labour and Conservative conference. And when you're there, this is an extraordinary environment. You know, lots of people, lots of sort of trade show kind of people as well, all there in one place for a few days, a sort of hothouse, but not one, I think, anymore that appeals as much to activists as to the broader world.
- [02:11]
A
Vince Cable said it's perfectly plausible that he could be the next Prime Minister. And as politics is in a state of flux, what do you think the future holds for the Liberal Democrats?
- [02:21]
B
Well, there's no doubt that this Liberal Democrat conference, which was the first of the three big British conferences, saw Vince Cable as the new leader of the party, trying to assert the possibility that he could, or that the Lib Dems could play a part in government and even begin to break through in the centre ground. Now, we know from earlier Liberal Democrat leaders, perhaps famously David Steele, you know, talking about, go back to your constituencies and prepare for government, that it's not as easy as it looks. And the reason for that is that although the Liberals, Liberal Democrats are a moderate centre party, it's very hard to break through. In our first past the post, broadly still two party system and the third party finds it very difficult. The Lib dems up to 2010 were building up over time. They got over 50 MPs by then and went into coalition with the Conservatives. But being in government damaged their credibility. They did very badly in 2015, barely better in 2017. So there is still a huge mountain to climb for Vince Cable and the Lib Dems, unless after the next general election, whenever it comes, there is the opportunity, if not to go into coalition, to support a government and get some power that way. But as for Vince Cable becoming Prime Minister in the next few years, well, can't say never say never these days, but I'd say it's still quite a long way from a reality.
- [03:54]
A
The Labour conference seemed generally upbeat, with Jeremy Corbyn appearing confident in his position and his policies. Are we seeing a more settled Labour Party and a potential government in waiting?
- [04:07]
B
Well, the Labour Party had a remarkable general election outcome and didn't win. Of course, it is worth remembering, as many people have to keep reminding the party itself, it didn't win. Theresa May and the Conservatives got the largest vote share, even if they didn't win either. But against expectations, Labour did very well. Their vote share increase was a big step, up to 40%, which is actually a very good vote share. And with that banked, I think, Labour members, particularly the new ones, the younger ones, some of them in momentum, some not. I think they feel that they're now just. If they can act as an opposition relatively effectively for a few years, they can sit and wait. And the Conservatives will, because of their own internal struggles and the difficulties of delivering Brexit, that Labour can somehow just wait and win next time. Now, that's not to say there aren't significant internal divisions within the Labour Party about Brexit, amongst other things. And also, of course, many Labour MPs privately still do not support the leadership. Jeremy Corbyn and his current leadership. So although Labour is in a substantially better place than the Conservatives after their conference, you know, it would be naive to pretend that Labour was definitely going to win the next election. I mean, you know, nobody can predict anything of that kind these days. So I think Labour had a. They were certainly optimistic at their conference. The mood was quite a good one. But only time will tell whether that mood and the renewed confidence of the leadership can translate itself through to a general election win.
- [05:50]
A
Theresa May came into the Conservative conference needing to respond to a disappointing election result and questions about her leadership. Will the wider Conservative Party be happy with what they saw?
- [06:03]
B
Well, Theresa May had an opportunity in Manchester to reset the dial, as it were, to say, you know, it's true, I made a mistake calling the election. She said that. That part of her speech, I think, went down well. If you accept you made a mistake and confess to it, people will give you the benefit of the doubt. It's commonly accepted that most Conservative MPs, regardless of what they think about Theresa May's long term potential as leader, don't want her to go just now. They don't want an unseemly squabble over another leadership race as they had as recently as last year. So that's kind of also a settled view. I think the challenge was that the conference was supposed to, as I say, reset the Conservatives image to show Theresa May regaining control. And it didn't work out like that. For all sorts of reasons that are well rehearsed in the media to do with the way the speech was delivered and some of the sort of prank that went on at the set, you know, during the speech and the set and everything. It kind of conspired to convey an unfortunate impression that she wasn't in control. Having said that, since the conference, senior members of the government are rallying round. Doesn't look to me as if the backbenchers who might want to trigger effectively a vote of confidence against her or to start a leadership process, they don't seem to me big enough in number to make that work. And going back to what I said a moment ago, the truth is most Conservative MPs in a sense will cling to Mrs. May for fear that something worse might happen if she went.
- [07:46]
A
What did conference season tell us about Brexit? Has the situation become any clearer?
- [07:52]
B
I think what the party conference season told us about Brexit is that both our major parties, the Labour and Conservative, are split. In fairness to the Lib Dems, they're not split. They have a pretty consistent view about Brexit. They're against it, though. I think they are trying to make themselves not look as if they're only an anti Brexit party, which is a separate issue. There's more to life than Brexit. But on the subject of Brexit, I think that Labour have the advantage of being an opposition party. So there are schisms and differences matter less than those inside the Conservative Party. It is the party in government. It is the party that has to negotiate with Brussels is trying to negotiate a little bit with separate, with individual countries within the EU separately. And the truth is, the progress of these negotiations is painfully Slow. And, you know, we've got some Conservative Cabinet members talking about a transition, possibly for more than two years and a transition leading to virtually no change, whereas others actively appear to want a sort of dead end in 2019, even if it means a cliff edge. That difference was on display. We don't have Cabinet unanimity here. So I think, in a sense, Labour can get away with their divisions more easily than the Conservatives can. And that was clear at the party conferences.
- [09:15]
A
Jeremy Corbyn says his Labour Party now represents the political mainstream and the Conservatives appear to be moving away from some of the less popular aspects of their election manifesto. Has the centre ground of UK politics moved to the left?
- [09:29]
B
British public opinion moves slightly to the left, slightly to the right over time. You can track this through measures such as attitudes to taxation and public spending. And it does appear at the moment as if there is, according to the British Survey of Social Attitudes and other studies, a slight move towards people being willing to put up with slightly higher taxes, perhaps if that will support higher spending. So possibly a slight shift to the left. But of course, the Labour leadership popularly, and I think even in its own view, is quite well to the left. It's fairly radical in these terms, although against that description, its manifesto for the 2017 General Election was actually a fairly moderate, social democratic one. It promised minor increases in public spending and taxes, mostly for the highest earning, but it wasn't a kind of like some earlier Labour manifestos, which was significantly more radical. So it's a complicated picture. So I think Labour probably are slightly picking up the mood of the times, but it's not part of a radical change, I think, in the way the British think, at least not so far. As far as the Conservatives are concerned, they face the challenge that they haven't come up with a set of policies that look like their own. So on issues such as housing, the energy cap and student funding, it all looks a bit like Labour light. And for a party to be offering these kind of policies, which sound a bit like what Ed Miliband was offering a few years ago, doesn't exactly look like a modern Conservative take on what the country needs. And if you add to that the fact that the Conservatives are clearly not connecting with younger voters, they have a very, very low vote share amongst young voters and more than that, they're struggling to sign up new members, I mean, of any age, but particularly among the young. So I think for a party that's to survive into the future, and they will all know this, they've got to come up with a way of modernizing themselves both in terms of policy, but therefore directly and indirectly in terms of their capacity to connect with the voters of tomorrow.
- [11:55]
A
Tony, thanks very much for joining us.
- [11:56]
B
Thank you.