Tory campaign has been a disaster thanks to Theresa May, but she will win

Mrs May’s campaign has had one resounding success. It has dispelled Tory complacency. Four weeks ago, that seemed to be a hard task. Why should Jeremy Corbyn do as well as Milipede minor in 2015: just over thirty per cent of the vote? Why should he even do as well as Michael Foot in 1983: twenty seven percent of the vote? The Liberals had no traction. Ukip was kippered. So what was to prevent the Tories from winning by twenty per cent?

Such speculations were dangerous. The public does not like large majorities. The late Bob McKenzie, who popularised the swingometer, claimed that the press headlines on polling day may have affected the outcome of the 1970 and February 1974 elections. In 1970, it was “Harold [Wilson] sweeps back in triumph: five more years of Harold.” Three and a half years later saw a similar message, this time about Ted Heath.

Bob thought that a lot of voters were put off. Even if they backed Harold or Ted, they did not approve of triumphs. They would have been happy to support a chastened figure, sadder and wiser, setting about his duties with due humility. But sweeping back: in that case, he does not need my vote. Such calculations influence margins. Margins determine outcomes.

Since then, headline writers have become more cautious, encouraged  by the polling companies, who stress that all their figures have a three per cent margin of error (of late, that has sometimes seemed more like ten per cent). Even so, there would have been no disguising the scale of the Tories’ likely victory on June 8, if early expectations had persisted.

That has not happened. Why? Barack Obama thinks that Mr Corbyn may be benefiting from the global anti-politics mood and picking up the same sort of people who supported Bernie Sanders. In one respect, that might seem paradoxical. Mr Corbyn has been around in politics since the Old Benn Age. Yet it is also true that no-one could mistake him for a professional politician. In that regard, as Colin Welch would have said, he would be as much use as a one-legged man in an arse-kicking contest. But to the young, he appears sincere, anti-elitist, not part of the system. The polls suggest that he has a huge lead among 18-24 year olds.

The polls also suggest that the Tories have the same sort of lead among the over sixty year olds, and there is a crucial difference. Older voters are much more likely to go to the polls. That may well mean that the Tories’ position is stronger than the opinion polls suggest.

But why is there any hint of weakness? Why is Theresa May struggling to defeat Jeremy Corbyn? There is an easy answer: weak authoritarianism leading to incompetence.

Mrs May has never been an easy colleague. As Home Secretary, she excluded junior ministers and officials from most decision-making, relying almost exclusively on her two special advisors, Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill. This has continued in No.10, which is no way to run a government. There is a malign disfunction. Mrs May seems to be too intellectually insecure to consult her Cabinet ministers properly. That is silly of her. She is abler than she appears to think she is. She has no reason to distrust her powers of argument.

With Mr Timothy, there is the opposite problem. He seems too intellectually arrogant to see the need for better consultation. If he were half as good as he thinks he is, he would be a genius. He is not a genius. Anyway, this great meritocrat took charge of the manifesto, failing to consult anyone who had been closely involved with previous manifestos. As several ministers and many officials who had given the matter considerable thought could have told him, social care is tricky. He was not interested in their advice. The result: assertion followed by bluster, followed by retreat.

The damage goes beyond the dementia tax. There was an impression that the government was simply not good enough. You can decide to run a government which is rigidly controlled from the centre. Although this would be unwise, it would not necessarily be doomed to failure. But if failure is to be averted, there is one pre-condition. You have to do it damned well. You cannot afford failures, especially when they would have been easily avoidable.

It is said that some of those around Mrs May have tried to defend her by comparisons with Margaret Thatcher. If so, that is hog-wash. There was a lot wrong in Mrs Thatcher’s relations with her colleagues: see the ‘Block-buster’ memo from John Hoskyns quoted in extenso by Charles Moore in his first volume. But they always had access to her mind (sometimes too much for comfort). Her public image was deceptive. She was not as invincible, decisive and all-powerful as many people came to think. But the public had a sense of her: who she was, what she believed.

As for Mrs May, it would appear that three people in the world know what she thinks: her husband and the two spads. The rest see an obsessively cautious woman with a tight, buttoned-up expression on her face and little apparent capacity for human warmth.

That is dangerous. Toryism has always been about generosity of spirit. This has a risky aspect. When it comes to self-confident toffs such as Messrs Cameron and Osborne, many voters are inclined to think: “It’s all right for them. They never have to worry about the bills.” In that respect, the product of an economising vicarage should have an advantage. But Mrs May carries it too far.

Tories should believe in encouraging and celebrating aspiration: in saying to anyone and everyone who wants to get on that the Conservative party is the party for you; in welcoming and applauding businesses and businessmen. But there has not been enough of that in this campaign. The great meritocrat Nick Timothy sometimes gives the impression that the only businessman he approves of is Joe Chamberlain. The anti-business tone has led to mutterings on Southern doorsteps. She needs those votes.

Against Corbyn, it is impossible to lose. That said, another cock-up would stretch Tory nerves to snapping point. Over the next nine days, Mrs May should avoid mistakes. That would be easier if she prised the spads’ jaws loose from the campaign’s throat and consulted – secretly – the odd greybeard. Stephen (Lord) Sherbourne would be an obvious choice. There has been no better political advisor since the war, and although he is over seventy, age has further advanced his wisdom without in any way diminishing his cunning.

The focus ought to be on wallets and purses. In many cases, they are running on empty; a lot of Tory voters are worried. But it should be possible – indeed easy – to persuade them that there is only one trustworthy Prime Ministerial candidate. That is Mrs May’s great advantage. A lot of voters are not over-impressed by any politician. Some of them are now muttering because Mrs May does not seem to be as good as they had hoped. But they know that they will have to plump for a Prime Minister. They might grumble between now and the 8th. They could even vent some of those grumbles on the pollsters. But she will probably walk away with a grumbling acquiescence.

It should have been better and it is her fault that it is not. But that will not stop her winning, as long as she will perform a vital service for party and country. No more blunders. As for the great bearded meritocrat, a lot of Tories would like him to agree to be shaved by a cut-throat razor, which unfortunately slips.