Xander West is an independent writer and author of the Grumbling Times substack.
Following the local elections, no-one can deny Reform has become a major player in British politics, to the extent it largely sets the political weather for the other parties.
It surely follows that Reform requires scrutinising as a potential party of government.
In this the party falls flat almost immediately, managing to replicate the same threadbare policy programme, intellectual vacuity and imprudent planning which is already popularly maligned about its two rivals.
Although this matters little for the moment, serious representation will force this to change.
These facts must form a pillar of the Conservatives’ still uncertain strategy against Reform, which remains woefully underdeveloped despite the increasing threat of extinction. Whilst shadow ministers correctly identify that Reform is not conservative, they lack much proof when pressed, something which their opponent’s policy vagueness does not help.
Provided Conservative politicians can rediscover and assemble a distinct conservative agenda, constitutional policy is one area where clear divisions exist between the two parties.
Reform’s policies on the constitution are predominantly confined to the party’s ‘Contract with You’, published ahead of the July 2024 general election and named as such because juvenility precluded declaring it a manifesto.
It reads more like a wish-list than a proper policy document and worded as if almost entirely extracted from hastily brainstormed bullet points, with an American-style fixation on the first 100 days of a potential government to boot.
Most subsequent announcements by the party have not particularly endeavoured to improve upon this formula. Nevertheless, some themes emerge which are clearly at odds with what a conservative constitutional policy should resemble. Reform’s policies are fed with the same diet of buzzwords and slogans, albeit tailored to its particular outlook, that has motivated other parties lately. This means many of Reform’s ideas are overly present-oriented on topics which most require an understanding of institutional inheritances and a long-term outlook. Consequently, the party is manifestly indifferent towards the legacies of several key institutions, leading to its potentially most destructive policies.
Reform’s largest target is the House of Lords, demanding abolition and replacement “with a much smaller, more democratic second chamber” initiated within the first few months of taking office.
The terse insertion of “structure to be debated” shortly after shows the party lacks the faintest idea about untangling the ancient body.
Reform’s contention with the Lords is the political appointment of peers, despite this stemming from Commons politicians and particularly the reigning government’s patronage powers.
A more conservative approach would arrange a convention between major parties to appoint with less liberality, hence greater qualification of each, to the peerage, or possibly give the House of Lords Appointments Commission greater latitude to reject proposed appointees. Instead, Reform has elected for the most radical option which produces questions at every turn of fundamental importance to British politics.
The party demands an “immediate end of political appointees,” so it must be assumed a new chamber would be wholly elected. A reduction in headline size is promised, but the present emphasis on experience and specific expertise in Lords debates means daily attendance is much lower. A smaller and likely fixed chamber would cripple its core functions by limiting members’ collective knowledge, assuming a Reform government even allows the new body to prioritise detailed legislative revision.
Replacing appointed peers with elected politicians might sound good, but it would prove even more deleterious.
How could there remain any serious check on members’ aptitude aside from partisan loyalty?
The partisanship innate in ex-politician peers is dampened fairly successfully through discretion on attendance and the space to focus on detail without much fanfare, leading to a more collegial spirit. Subjecting the upper chamber to elections would obliterate this entirely. Instead, members would be forced to raise their profiles and grandstand on current issues to ensure re-election, thus take a more confrontational stance on bills rather than quietly work to improve their quality.
Would voters sufficiently participate in elections to a chamber lacking power to grant it legitimacy, or tolerate a rebalancing of the Houses that would explicitly reduce the power of MPs? What would result from both Houses claiming democratic mandates for opposing parties? Would this upper chamber be right to abuse its functions to wreck and delay the government’s programme if it had a majority for that end? Where would parliamentary sovereignty lie in practice with two elected chambers? What about political accountability? These questions barely scratch the surface of what should be asked, but Reform has no immediate answers. The current House of Lords is not perfect, but the party’s changes would be nothing short of catastrophic, with constitutional crises potentially becoming the norm and power ironically moving closer to politicians’ dealmaking abilities than voters.
Another target for Reform within the first 100 days is the Civil Service, where they wish to replace its “leaders with successful professionals from the private sector, who are political appointees, who come and go with the government.” Although the party gives no reason, although presumably connected to the efficiency of government and bureaucratic obstruction, it again chooses excessive and unnecessary radicalism.
Instead of working from the laudable spirit of the 1854 Northcote-Trevelyan Report, of which the current Civil Service is a poorer descendant yet still possessing that framework for improving standards, Reform would uproot the body’s foundations and thus cause further troubles. Would this government appoint a more competent professional of a different political persuasion to a role, or the one most loyal to party interests? How many senior civil servants would require politicisation before Reform could trust them to implement its policies? If the party lacks faith in Civil Service leaders, what about the bulk of junior civil servants? Again, Reform has no clear answers.
It is clear the politics of the next few years will be about change; the general election and local elections provide more than enough evidence of popular demand.
Yet Reform seems to see its namesake as an end in itself, meddling with and promising whatever it feels because everything constitutes the same status quo to its leaders. Its unbounded approach embodies a fundamental flaw of populism: just because certain ideas sound appealing and poll well does not mean they will solve whatever problem they ostensibly address or will not entail disagreeable consequences. Not all change is inevitably good, as shown by the ‘achievements’ of the Labour government so far, reeling from the misalignment between the promises of its ‘Change’ manifesto and ministers’ continuity managerial approach.
That same strategy helped to shatter the Conservatives, from which they must now drastically reverse course or disappear.
Reform is not conservative, lacks intellectual hinterland and is indifferent towards institutional conservation, yet this was almost equally true of the previous government.
To rediscover conservatism in the Conservative Party will be to demonstrate decisively a break with that legacy and formulate an idea of conservative change circumscribed by consistent principles, a focussed practicality and common sense.
Conservatives can recognise the capacity and necessity for change, in all areas of policy, without resorting to sweeping schemes which risk multiplying the problems at hand, as Reform in its heedlessness might enact for the sake of difference and insatiable populist ideals.
Nevertheless, conservatism retains a capacity for imagination, which when combined with a better understanding of change could produce an innovative offering and distinct choice to the electorate. These are not simple suggestions, but nothing about the Conservatives’ renewal shall be easy.
Still, the slim chance yet exists for the Conservatives to create a programme for responsible reform better than Reform ever could.
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