GENERAL ELECTION 2017

During this election, Theresa May has conducted such an anodyne campaign that there was an earlier suspicion that she may have felt she could get away with not presenting a manifesto. After all, did she really need too? Riding high in all opinion polls, and with the Labour Party in no proper or fit state to present a genuine challenge, she has been able to glide through on soundbites and rhetoric. Why risk inviting trouble?

In the last few days, that manifesto was delivered. There is little in its pages that really rocks the boat. There is little about Brexit, other than a few broad details we are already aware of. Considering that this snap election was called purely because Mrs May wanted Brexit negotiations to be done her way, the lack of clarity is disappointing if unsurprising.

Whilst not entirely risk-free from voter desertion, the elderly will have good reason to feel hard done by. The triple lock on pensions will no longer be guaranteed, and worryingly for those in England and Wales, a greater proportion of the cost of social care is being passed on to individuals. Many will fear the loss of their home and other capital assets in paying for it.

Aside from that, Mrs May has pledged a ‘mainstream government that would deliver for mainstream Britain’, a slogan which appears accurate for a set of proposals which aren’t too far off centre. It is here where she is likely to succeed in securing victory on June 8, by deliberately moving into the area Labour had to occupy to get Tony Blair into Downing Street (just as Labour under Jeremy Corbyn vacate the middle ground to set up camp on the far left).

The stance taken by the prime minister represents astute politics, and much the same can be said of her handling of the Scottish Government’s request for a second independence referendum. Again, Mrs May plays the ‘now is not the time card’ which kicks another ballot anytime soon into the long grass. No doubt she will try to avoid the matter until after the next Holyrood elections – in the hope that, by that time, the SNP will not be in a position to call a referendum. It’s hard and timely politics at work.

If Mrs May’s advisers can keep her out of trouble, the manifesto should be enough to secure the majority she seeks. By aiming for the middle ground, she has started a process of countering the Tories ‘nasty party’ image. Yet, this manifesto tells us very little about what life will be like under Mrs May, because our future will be determined by Brexit. Until we know what that is, we cannot really judge on whether the Conservative Party has changed for the good.