Who Do They Think They Are?

In the spirit of Thatcherism and of New Labour, those plotting the New Party see it as the vehicle for the sons and daughters of the middle middle classes to rise through the state schools and the good but not necessarily grand universities, via 15 or 20 years of success in the private sector, to take their places in early middle age as the guardians of the liberal order at home and abroad.

That guardianship would not be without domestic and international robustness, using soft power where possible but very hard power where necessary, including by means of an unquestionable alliance between the European Union and the United States, an alliance with Britain at both its cultural and its military heart.

Now look up the life stories of Angela Smith, and Chris Leslie, and Luciana Berger, and Chuka Umunna, and all the rest of them. Apart from the domestic repressiveness and the international belligerence, they are as far removed from any of that as New Labour really was, and they are as far removed from any of that as Thatcherism really was.

Another hung Parliament is coming, however, and we need our people to hold the balance of power in it. It has become a local commonplace that I am on 30-30-30 with Labour and the Conservatives here at North West Durham, so that any one of us could be the First Past the Post. I will stand for this seat, if I can raise the £10,000 necessary to mount a serious campaign. Please email davidaslindsay@hotmail.com. Very many thanks.