These Tory backbenchers will bang on until they hit self-destruct

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/22/tory-backbenchers-will-self-destruct

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The spectacle of the Conservative party in turmoil is oddly familiar for those with long and painful memories of Labour in the lost 80s. Then, as now, militants with bilious ideologies put their own political passions before victory. Too few follow what Lord Ashcroft's forensic polling shows they need to do. Only connect, he says, but burning conviction overrides common sense.

The strangest manifestation is their detestation of their leader. Disloyalty and disaffection stalk the corridors. Might they really remove him? Few think them that far gone, but when Sunday Times and Daily Telegraph political correspondents decide it's within the realms of possibility, outsiders can only stare in amazement. David Cameron is their one electoral asset. He out-polls his party by some 7% with an affable public persona. However extreme the austerity he pursues – shrinking the state, stripping public services, assaulting the poor while cutting top tax – his bland appearance and relaxed demeanour are the perfect cover. Even when banging on about Europe this week, he won't sound like the ranters in his party he is trying to appease. Though Oliver Letwin and Francis Maude in the Cabinet Office drive forward his state-crushing engine, he doesn't look like a man carving out the most rightwing programme in modern times. So why doesn't his party admire their great deceiver?

Never underestimate the stupidity of the stupid party: they seem as easily deceived as the voters by those early images of Cameron the husky-hugger fixing a windmill to his roof. The last remnants of Cameron's modernising are gay marriage and the overseas aid budget, talismans of social liberalism and concern for the poor that infuriate his party beyond reason. Gay marriage is an incomprehensible dispute to a non-religious public at ease with civil partnerships. But 70% of local Tory party chairs oppose it, with 120 MPs expected to rebel. The tiny aid budget is diverted towards political and trade aims, yet it riles them out of all proportion.

Though loathing Cameron's modernising disguise, after three defeats they were ready to try anything. But he didn't win, they detest the coalition and at 10% behind, sense little prospect of an outright sod-the-Lib-Dems victory. Failure is what always tears parties apart. Who are the haters? Provincials resent the Notting Hill-Eton clique. MPs excluded from power grumble that Cameron rarely glad-hands in the tea rooms. The Bernard Jenkin old-school, high-Tory right feels snubbed, while Michael Heseltine and Ken Clarke, wise old moderates, launch broadsides against extremism. David Davis, the leadership loser, never rests, reminding his party of its fast-dying-out Daily Express voters.

A few in southern marginals, like Robert Halfon, try vainly to tug the party towards the everyday concerns of his "white van Tories", but pragmatism is out of step. Class of 2010 Fresh Starters and Britannia Unchained abrasives are a new breed, boding ill for the party's future; neo-Republicans, inspired by the US social and economic right, these bright theorists are yet more removed from squeezed-middle Britain than their elders. The Bright Blue modernisers are only a little platoon on the lonely David Willetts wing. Dominating the scene is Tim Montgomerie's ConservativeHome, tugging ever rightwards. Each new leader since 1997 has toyed with the centre, but prevailing Tory winds and their own gut instinct blew them back on the rightwing rocks. Cameron is on the same journey, but this party learns no lessons.

Europhobia binds them, but whatever Cameron says this week will disappoint. Look where "banging on" has got them so far. Though promising "renegotiation" Cameron advocates Britain staying in the EU, while business voices raise the alarm about exit. As a result, opinion has swung the wrong way. For the first time in this parliament, YouGov finds more voters for staying in than for getting out. YouGov says once obliged to decide, people fear leaving.

This week's quarterly growth figures are predicted to be grim. May elections threaten more Tory wipeouts. Nor do Cameron's newfound "decades" of war on terror set Tory pulses racing: the Telegraph's defence editor writes sourly that he "is conveniently overlooking the fact that he has helped to create [the al-Qaida in the Magreb] by his ill-judged decision to overthrow the regime of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi". What issue might revive Tory fortunes? Not even scroungers are a reliable winner, as a Guardian poll shows opinion shifting fast against the benefit cuts.

What do the malcontents want? Not the centre ground. They call for sharper action on the debt and deficit, though deeper cuts mean higher debts. They want the coalition broken up soon. They want a clear blue ideological path – and some want Cameron gone. Unusual suspects are heard knife-sharpening. Tim Montgomerie thinks it unlikely, but adds "The Tory party is ruthless", as he holds the door open a crack for Boris. If Labour move 20% ahead, if there's no real recovery, Boris, the rule-defier, might bounce back as an MP, he posits.

Professor Tim Bale, the political analyst, calls them "a party of resentment", yearning for "fantasy policies", fractious and unforgiving. He warns that party rules can let just 47 MPs write to the chair of the 1922 Committee to trigger a vote of no confidence. No round robin is needed, just individual letters, unseen by whips. This is a wobbling party losing its automatic stabilisers, wrangling over strange things of no interest to most voters. Yet surely even they are not mad enough to strip away their great Cameron camouflage?