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Magazine to sue John Major over libel case
timesonline.co.uk
Tories warned against drift back to basics
timesonline.co.uk
Tories warned against drift back to basics
By Tom Baldwin and Tim Reid in Dallas
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EDWINA CURRIE’S disclosures about her affair with John Major have put Iain Duncan Smith under renewed pressure to renounce the Conservative Party’s traditional moral agenda next week.
Tory modernisers told The Times last night that the party must use its conference to eradicate memories of Mr Major’s “back to basics” campaign and other forms of “proscriptive morality”. Although Mrs Currie and the former Prime Minister are expected to stay away from the Bournemouth conference, their past liaison threatens to overshadow attempts to change the party’s image.
Mr Duncan Smith wants to show voters that the Conservative Party cares about vulnerable people in society and public services. However, in recent weeks party modernisers have been alarmed that the caring strategy could mean a hardline stance on “family” issues.
The Tory leader has reaffirmed his support for the Section 28 law which bans local authorities from promoting homosexuality. He has drafted in Tim Montgomerie, director of the Conservative Christian Fellowship and a traditionalist on subjects such as gay rights and abortion, to help to write his keynote conference speech.
The Tory leader is also understood to have planned a big initiative on drugs, designed to eradicate narcotics in Britain. The policy has caused rifts at Conservative Central Office: modernisers say it risks repeating the mistakes made by Ann Widdecombe, then Shadow Home Secretary, whose “zero tolerance” proposals wrecked a bid at the 2000 conference to change the party’s image.
One senior member of the Shadow Cabinet said yesterday: “There is a real danger that in acknowledging there is such a thing as society and addressing social issues, we could end up with ‘back to basics II’. I think that the consequence of the Currie stuff will be to change that tone to saying we are not interested in telling people how to live their lives. It is certainly going to be more difficult for people to say why they oppose the repeal of Section 28 — I hope so, anyway.”
But Steven Norris, who was Tory candidate for London Mayor in 2000, said that he would be raising Section 28 at fringe meetings: “Attempts to proscribe lifestyles are doomed to failure. You would have thought that Conservatives would have learnt that.”
Mrs Currie said last night that she would not be attending the conference because she does “not want to cause the party any more embarrassment than necessary”. However, she added, her disclosures should have a salutary effect on the Tories. “If they try to tell people how to live, the electorate will blow them a great big raspberry. Section 28 was always a foolish policy and should be scrapped.
“We’ve got to get real about why we failed or we will not get real about how to succeed. We should be making mincemeat out of this Government but we can’t even get the sausage skins together,” she said.
Mr Major is not expected back from America until the end of next week, and has no plans to attend the conference. On Wednesday he made his first public appearance since the scandal broke, speaking at a $500-a-plate black-tie dinner in Dallas in aid of a Texan charity of which he is a patron.During his speech, which the press was banned from covering after Mr Major instructed that all media accreditation for the event be withdrawn, he made no reference to his private life. He had been smuggled into an underground car park in a limousine with blacked-out windows and by yesterday morning had vanished. |
