The Spectator’s Notes | 25 February 2006

Tory criticism of David Cameron has begun. Robin Harris gives the best articulation so far of the case against the new leader in the latest issue of Prospect. This attack was inevitable, and some of it is correct. It is wrong, for example, to disparage grammar schools — and this was a mistake which no non-public-school-educated Conservative would have made. But the critics still have not understood the premise on which Mr Cameron’s actions are based. They work on the assumption that the Conservative party has a secure place in the political landscape. It has only to achieve the right policies, therefore, and it will win the election. Mr Cameron thinks this assumption is false: the Conservative party’s position is insecure, so much so that the party’s endorsement of a policy actually weakens it in the public favour. His first public task, therefore, is to rebuild the reputation of the party.