Kmflett's Blog

After worst ever Election defeat the Tories are down to their last £3m. A Party of Capital that is no good at capitalism?

Depending on how you want to read the statistics the defeat of the Tory Party on July 4th, winning 121 seats, was the worst since 1911 or 1832. Some may wonder what happens next.

Rishi Sunak remains as leader for the moment and the pre-Election talk of a merger between the Tories and Reform, or a split from the Tories to Reform- in other words a realignment on the right continues. The I Paper reported (20th July) that if Braverman can’t get enough backing for a Tory leadership bid she may defect to Reform in the Autumn. Presumably that would be timed for the Tory Conference.

Yet there is the near future too. Sunak has made it clear that he is not hanging around for long, so a new leader, interim or permanent, is required.

When Labour lost in 2019 the Labour right spun it as the worst result since 1935 (when the Party was recovering from the 1931 split- the parallel is too little explored) but that was on seats not total votes. It can hardly have been missed that Labour won in 2024 by getting less votes than Corbyn in 2017 but getting them in the right places. As an Election strategy it worked well..

This post is not about Labour however, simply to note that for a long while after December 2019 much of the media was full of stories and comment about Labour’s travails.

Look for similar media on the Tories post July 4th and you will struggle. The Spectator and the Times have carried stories. In short new officers of the backbench 1922 Committee have been elected (there was controversy because not all Tory MPs were told about the closing time of the vote) and they met this week to decide what to do about the leadership.

The Observer (21st July) reported that some former Tory MPs want an extended leadership campaign possibly running into 2025 while a discussion about what future the Party has takes place. Some also apparently plan a ‘swift’ return to Parliament although quite how that might be achieved is not explained, given that the 121 Tory MPs elected on 4th July was probably at the upper end of the potential

In essence they could not decide so will meet again next week. Some want a fairly quick leadership election before Sunak clears off. If that doesnt happen and the matter is determined at the Tory Conference at the end of September a temporary leader may be needed.

This is in the context of a financial crisis. The Tories are the party of capital  but post-election the Sunday Times has reported that they have only £5m in funds, £2m of which is needed to cover redundancies following the July 4^th defeat. In essence the Tories are down to their last £3m.

Meanwhile the contenders for the leadership await. There seem to be around half a dozen. They are all of course hard to far right-wing and very unpleasant. It’s a sign of the scale of the defeat that leadership candidates will need the initial backing of 10 Tory MPs. This doesn’t matter in Parliamentary or Electoral terms just now.

But with the far and fascist right on the rise across Europe and Farage and Yaxley Lennon stirring it here, there could be trouble ahead if a close watch is not kept on what is happening here. Yaxley Lennon’s central London gathering on 27^th July is the first occasion that requires opposition.