Spectator debate: ‘Pity Cameron’s a Heath not a Thatcher’

Last week’s Spectator debate — ‘Britain’s in decline again. Pity Cameron is a Heath not a Thatcher’ — looked at the nature of a future Tory government under David Cameron.

Last week’s Spectator debate — ‘Britain’s in decline again. Pity Cameron is a Heath not a Thatcher’ — looked at the nature of a future Tory government under David Cameron. Proposing the motion, Simon Heffer surprised everyone by launching into a warm tribute to Ted Heath. ‘A serious talent’, Heath had been hobbled by a ‘terrible desire to let the state take control’. In office he demonstrated a fatal ‘flexibility of principle’. Heffer worried that Cameron had the same predilection for followership not leadership. ‘I want a Conservative victory,’ said the Heff, ‘but do I want a victory with these Conservatives?’

Bruce Anderson opened with a pre-emptive attack on Peter Hitchens, accusing him of ‘sectarian fanaticism’. The account Hitchens has given of the present Tory party comes ‘straight from his bile-duct’.