The more Tory candidates for leader the better

“If there is one lesson from the referendum of 2016 it is that too many people feel left behind,” said Boris Johnson in the video he released yesterday to launch his campaign for the leadership of the Conservative Party.

Just stop and re-read that sentence: “If there is one lesson from that referendum of 2016 it is that too many people feel left behind.”

The referendum you will recall was on whether the United Kingdom should or should not remain a member of the European Union – leave or remain.

Here however, Boris, with the consummate skill of the performer that he is, has re-written the script. While his colleagues and the media are consumed with Brexit, Boris has turned his attention back to domestic issues where he knows most people’s real interest is focussed most of the time – on teachers, nurses, school places, doctors, roads, railways, and all the other things that matter to each one of us day-to-day.

It is there in his video with him talking directly to the camera: “If there is one lesson from that referendum of 2016 it is that too many people feel left behind.” No mention of sovereignty, parliamentary supremacy, freedom to do trade deals – nothing, not a peep. It is so startling, so blatant that it is easy to just glide right over it, but we should stop, pause and think about what is going on here.

Since the Conservative Party first started electing its leaders in 1965, first by MPs and latterly by MPs and party members, there have been nine leadership contests. I have been directly involved one way or another in six of them.

Ted Heath was the first elected leader and along with Margaret Thatcher, John Major and William Hague, he was the choice of his House of Commons colleagues. Between them these four leaders gave 32 years of leadership to the party. It was Hague who decided to extend the franchise to the party’s membership in the country. Under this system the party will have had five leaders in 18 years.

In our system of Parliamentary democracy the person who can command a majority in the House of Commons is the person who becomes the Prime Minister. In recent times we have become used, too used maybe, to that being either the Conservative or Labour leader. Party members electing a leader who parliamentary colleagues find it difficult to support in the House has become a feature of modern politics. Michael Howard and Theresa May became leaders unopposed and therefore no ballot of party members was required. In this country we elect parties not personalities into power. Nevertheless the relentless march of the cult of personality is an ever stronger feature of modern politics. Our system is increasingly struggling to reconcile these two antithetical pressures.

Since Theresa May announced her intention to resign as Leader of the Conservative Party and then in time as Prime Minister, a record number of Conservative members of parliament have put themselves forward for election as leader. So far the number has reached a peak of thirteen, before falling back for the moment to eleven as James Cleverly and Kit Malthouse announced their withdrawal from the contest. Their time is coming, even if it has not yet quite arrived. This unprecedentedly large number of candidates has been greeted in some quarters by a loud groan as somehow betokening a lack of seriousness and ‘grownup-ness’. Notably a highly unlikely public alliance of Alan Duncan, Iain Duncan Smith and James Brokenshire have all publicly bemoaned the number of candidates, but I think they are wrong and out of touch with the new more energetic and fragmented politics that is beginning to emerge.

Few really believe the referendum of 2016 was solely or evenly mainly about Europe. The referendum, as referendums often do, became a lightening rod for a massive expression of discontent with the prevailing political settlement. Boris understood then, as he does now, that the referendum could be used to upturn the political establishment that, for all his personal establishment credentials, was unlikely ever to embrace him as party leader and Prime Minister. He needed a game-changer, to ‘throw an elbow’ and the referendum for him was it. Now, three years on, this is his moment – possibly, probably, maybe.

The new and exciting feature of this leadership contest is in fact the large number of people throwing their hats into the ring. This is a good thing. The sensible process drawn up by the 1922 Committee can soon whittle down the number of contestants, but in the meantime there is a lively and vibrant debate about future policy and direction. Gone are the days when a leader emerges, gone are the days when the election of the leader was the sole preserve of MPs, this time round it will be MPs and Party members. Soon however that franchise will be extended to non-members. Labour will get there too and so will all parties. Nigel Farage may be able to create a party and appoint himself leader but as the succession at UKIP has shown if you do not nurture and encourage talent to follow you then your legacy is the destruction of your own political machine. There is no long-term future with that model.

The Conservative contest is better and healthier for having a large number of people participating. It is generating energy and interest. So far it has been a very restrained, very dignified affair, but of course the contest proper has not really started yet – we are still in the “phoney war” stage. Once the contest tightens and polling day draws nearer then we can expect the contest to become more robust, more boisterous – and that’s the age in which we live. That in fact is always the age in which we live when look for a leader and Prime Minister. We want some energy, drive, charisma, purpose, some zip and zing. The more candidates, the better the contest. The age of a few party grandees stitching up the Tory leadership is long gone.