In praise of Jacob Rees-Mogg, the secret centrist

These are hard times for centrists, though we should be used to that by now. My tribe – clever, technocratic, sometimes liberal and sometimes smug – has been losing arguments and elections consistently for several years, often deservingly. We may know all about how policy works, but we haven’t been great at politics.

A common centrist lament comes from looking at the current government and despairing at the way libertarian ideologues have taken control, running the country according to the ideas found in Institute for Economic Affairs pamphlets and Allister Heath columns. Is there no one in government who is prepared to take a pragmatic, what-works approach to policy?

Well, I have good news for my anguished centrist chums. We do indeed have a friend in high places, a minister who is open to ideas regardless of their political complexion, interested in evidence and concerned about the situation of the disadvantaged.