The Spectator’s Notes | 8 October 2005

Blackpool

‘With his designer wife, his two children (there is a third on the way) and his Notting Hill home, Mr Cameron does not look like a traditional Tory,’ I read in the papers. In what sense is this not a traditional Tory set of attributes? True, most Tories do not have designer wives — either in the sense of ‘designer t-shirt’ or in the sense meant here, that Mrs Cameron is a designer (of handbags) — but it is perfectly normal for them to have two children with a third on the way and, if they are rich, to have a house in Notting Hill. The thought behind sentences such as that quoted is that Mr Cameron is the candidate for change and therefore, as night follows day, cannot be a traditional Tory. In fact, though, one reason Mr Cameron has done very well here this week is that he is a traditional Tory, and of a familiar, comforting sort.