The contrast with the waxing fortunes of the SNP illustrates the importance of knowing when to pass the torch.
The next election may see increasingly distinct pitches from each of the parties towards sections of the latter.
Plus: The Australian Liberals should have gone for Julie Bishop. Joe Pike’s Project Fear. And: Who’s afraid of the Big Bad Cyber Corbynistas?
In response to Paul Abbott, here’s a personal account from the front-line, since I’ve been reselected as the Conservative Parliamentary Spokesman for Tooting.
My new book collects the reports from my focus groups and explores what the public really thought of the election (when they thought about it at all).
On the surface, this intake looks different from those that have preceded it – and is in some respects. But beneath it, this is in many ways a very traditional Tory group.
Shift our organisation to an interest-based model; lower financial barriers to membership; foster genuine debate; and increase competition and rewards for young volunteers.
A weak opposition will let the Chancellor set the agenda, and invite a ‘risk versus stability’ frame which plays to his strengths as a candidate.
All four teams used different systems. Sometimes these spoke with each other. But, most of the time – this being the Conservative Party – they didn’t.
Labour’s independent election review finds an electorate which wants an activist government that lives within its means. Where have we heard that before?
The Prime Minister’s success springs from a preference, new to Westminster, for Cabinet ministers who actually know about their departments.
They might get it in part, but does the wider Labour Party?
The last of our profiles looks at a region that witnessed another Liberal Democrat extinction event and the undoing of the People’s Army.
By deliberately underplaying the Conservative beliefs that help drive him, he’s had greater room for manoeuvre in putting them into practice.