The mighty Tory party, the most electorally successful in European history, has, like the once all-conquering British car industry, no one but itself to blame for its eclipse.
The death of the party has been predicted regularly since its founding in the 1830s, most recently in The Strange Death of Tory England by Geoffrey Wheatcroft published in March 2005. Two months later, the party climbed to 198 seats with 32.4 per cent of the popular vote in the general election, and five years later was back in the place it regards as its birthright, power.
Now though is different, as confirmed by Stuart Ball, Britain’s leading historian of the party and my long-time co-author. The current travails he says “are the most threatening in the party’s entire history”.
The facts are incontestable. Five prime ministers in 14 years all departed traumatically, with two, Johnson and Truss, unsuitable for the premiership. Defeat in the 2024 general election was the most crushing ever with the party limping home with 121 MPs, far bleaker than earlier landslide defeats of 1906, 1945 and 1997. The local government results in May 2025 were catastrophic, the worst again in the party’s history with just 15 per cent of the vote and the party in fourth position. The May 2026 locals saw 563 seats lost, the only positive being they weren’t quite as awful as the year before.
Kemi Badenoch, leader since November 2024 has performed better in the last few months, helped by some sharp PMQ performances, Labour’s long woes under Starmer, and Reform’s momentum being arrested by financial irregularities and the nonsense by-election in Clacton. Badenoch’s personal polling as leader has reached the highest level since Johnson in 2021, but the party is still polling only 20 per cent, just 2 per cent up from May and down on the general election’s 23.7 per cent and on the day she succeeded Sunak in November when the party’s average polling was 26 per cent, just behind Labour.
The party’s immediate fate though lies substantially in the hands of others, Farage and Burnham, never a comfortable position. The latter has ruled out an early general election. But PMs have before and done the opposite. Pollster James Johnson says if he went in late 2026 or early 2027, Labour would win with a majority of 90+, Reform second with 100+ and the Tories on less than 100, meaning it’s no longer the official opposition party. Or Burnham might decide, if his momentum continues, Reform remains troubled and Badenoch is unable to improve her party’s polling, to go in the autumn of 2027 when his senior colleagues in vulnerable constituencies might hold on. Relegated for the first time to third doesn’t spell the end of the Tories: it might even be the shock that it needs. But it will be uncharted and dangerous territory.
Tories have been in no doubt who is to blame for the mess: Rishi Sunak. When researching Sunak at 10: the Last Tory PM? published this week, the most critical people co-author Tom Egerton and I interviewed were Badenoch supporters, followed by Tories who defected to Reform, then Johnson and Truss cronies. Starmerites were mild in comparison. And Sunak’s sins? Where does one start? Stabbing election-winner Johnson in the back, being “a closet social democrat” (said a Badenoch supporter), hopelessly apolitical and wasting time on Northern Ireland, AI, maths and banning smoking – or was it failing to stop the boats? To cap it all, totally screwing up general election timing (“He went early as he could take it no more,” we were often told), mucking up the campaign with disasters like returning from the D-Day anniversary early and leading the party to the historic election defeat.
Like John Major in 1997, or indeed Starmer in 2026, Sunak is everyone’s convenient scapegoat. He had his flaws for sure, was inexperienced and too young. Hopelessly boxed in though he was with time and factionalism, he could have done more to address the Tories’ chronic failures to be good stewards, bequeathing to Labour sewage-filled rivers, bursting prisons, inadequate water and energy supplies and rising school absenteeism.
But the real reason for the Tories’ existential crisis goes much deeper, namely abandoning the keys that made it dominate the long “Conservative Century” from 1886-1997. These are its hunger for office, loyalty to the leader and appeal to all sections of the nation. Polls prove that the damage to the party’s electoral position was not under Sunak, but Johnson who lost it the reputation for trustworthiness and Truss, who obliterated the party’s record for economic competence. When Johnson became PM in July 2019, the party was 4 per cent ahead of Labour: by the time Sunak became PM in October 2022, Labour was a full 30 per cent ahead. He cut that lead to 10 per cent by the general election in July 2024, despite Farage’s late decision to join Reform costing the Tories some 80 seats.
Sunak had deep concerns about becoming PM after Truss, and in his heart knew his tenure would only end one way. The twin cancers of entitlement and denial had gripped his party. Repeated obfuscation about the damage Brexit had done to Britain was one manifestation. Bizarre figures who would have got nowhere near Tory Cabinets of old now found themselves being swished around in ministerial cars, while self-aggrandisement and poor performance were openly tolerated, and political aides, neither elected nor recognised by the constitution, ruled over their political master. “Aides and party officials did not act in this way before, and I have seen no evidence of them in the past actively undermining Cabinet ministers or the PM,” said Ball.
Sunak battled to stick to his “five priorities”, avoid U-turns and cut inflation from 10.7 to 2 per cent. He took on his right wing to drive through the Windsor Framework which replaced Johnson’s flawed Northern Ireland Protocol, completed Brexit, restored relations with the EU, and paved the way for the restoration of power-sharing in Stormont. At every step he sought to bind his party together. He never made play of being Britain’s first non-white Prime Minister, blamed no one else and when defeat came, avoided self-pity and conducted himself impeccably beyond Downing Street. He was indeed Britain’s first 21st century PM, comprehending finance, technology and AI: the tech bros thought they were talking to an equal, rare amongst global leaders. He left the economy, the country, its standing in the world and the Union stronger. Not a good enough record for his Tory detractors: but not shabby either.
Will the Tory party find its way back to power? Certainly if it returns to its winning posture, a one nation party with support across all sections of society, headed by people of principle and trustworthiness, putting the nation, its economy, communities and preservation of the Union first. Admitting that Brexit failed is vital to the process. It damaged business and growth and failed to deliver its promised benefits. Tory voters know the truth. As Ball says, “As long as the party remains so diehard on Brexit, it will be difficult to attract back centrist Tory voters who it has lost.” Committing to reopening trading, economic and security links, while steering clear of the bureaucratic and legalistic snares, would signal that the party is on its way back to sanity. Losing some prominent voices to Reform will be a price worth paying for it. Rethinking its relations with the EU will help re-establish its reputation for economic competence too, as it had under Major and Ken Clarke, Cameron and Osborne, and Sunak and Hunt.
Theresa May, another leader like Sunak sneered at by the present Tory leadership, warned against it becoming “the nasty party”. That is exactly what it became under Johnson and Truss. And look what happened. Badenoch needs to act more like a Tory leader with dignity and not an insurgent. After previous defeats in 1964 and 1997, the new leaders of the party, Heath and Hague, didn’t treat the defeated Tory prime ministers as she has done Sunak: apologising would be a good start.
Badenoch has strong leadership qualities. But her tribalism is impeding recovery, as in denying parliamentary seats to experienced hands like Grant Shapps and Penny Mordaunt. Neither is trying to outplay Reform: rather, let it blow itself out. Britain is naturally a Conservative nation: it needs to return to the centre ground, led by proficient and respected politicians on top of reengineering the country for the AI age. The sooner it does so, the quicker the most formidable force in political history will return to power. Even if it takes till the late 2030’s or 2040’s.
Anthony Seldon and Tom Egerton’s Sunak at 10: The last Tory Prime Minister? is published this week.
[Further reading: The Burnham bounce is an illusion]
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Subscribe here to commentTwo points land: Brexit denial does repel the centrist voters the party needs back, and Sunak is plainly a convenient scapegoat for a collapse the polling dates to Johnson and Truss.
But the piece’s own charge-sheet is broader than its remedy. It concedes the party bequeathed sewage-filled rivers, bursting prisons, inadequate water and energy supplies and rising school absenteeism — fourteen years of visible non-delivery — then prescribes, almost entirely, a change of position on Brexit.
Admitting Brexit failed addresses the denial; it does nothing for the delivery. A voter who watched services decay has no obvious reason to return because the party updated one policy stance.
The premise carrying optimism — “Britain is naturally a Conservative nation” — is asserted, not argued. And the evidence in the piece suggests otherwise: fourth place in 2025, 20 per cent now, fate resting with Burnham and Farage. Ground once held can be taken for good; the Liberals after 1922 were also a formidable governing force.
Nothing here explains why the centre ground would stay vacant while the Tories spend a decade becoming fit to reoccupy it.
The recovery timeline of “the late 2030s or 2040s” makes the prediction hard to test on any useful horizon. A diagnosis this broad needs a prescription to match, and faith in natural Conservatism is not one.
I am unsure how any leader or party can re-establish trading etc links with the EU and avoid “bureaucratic and legalistic snares”: the two are inextricably bound together, as the current government is discovering. Selsdon subscribes to a certain view of the world held by extreme Remainers, that Brexit is original sin, but in reality its only a small part of the Tories’, or indeed the country’s, malaise. Do what he suggests, and the Tories would lose all their remaining support. Their hope lies in re-establishing their reputation for competent economic management, and that lies at least in part in whether this government continues to avoid grasping the nettle of pro growth policies.
Yes, all makes sense, but I am seeing some appetite for a conservative economic message. In my very leftwing borough of London, a mainstream lettings agent was telling me that the housing market needed a Reform-Tory coalition (Reform has “some people who come from property”; the Tories presumably provide political ballast). After the Clapton dud, I sense Reform messaging going in an economic direction (as against a pure populist one). And as Stephen Bush was noting on Bluesky, Cleverly should be promising to give tax cuts with the tax proceeds that Burnham may offer the mayor. Houchen in the Tees Valley is already doing this. I think the Burnham government has a lot of work to do and needs some success.