ASK any Tory MP what they think of David Davis and you will get a pretty emphatic reply.
The Shadow Home Secretary is either loved or loathed by his colleagues at Westminster. Admirers are full of tales of his generosity, loyalty and help during hard times. The comments of his enemies are largely unprintable.
Speaking to The Times on the eve of his leadership campaign launch, Mr Davis — who is the frontrunner to succeed Michael Howard — tackles head on his unpopularity with parts of the party, but said it was not true that leaders he has served do not trust him.
“I am strong minded about many issues. I argue my case firmly. But I don’t think you’ll find the people I’ve worked for being antagonistic towards me. What you may find is the people around them are,” he said.
“Politics attracts courtiers and no doubt I have crossed the courtiers many times. But I am the elected representative. I have a job to do. I carry the responsibility.”
Many of his enemies date back to his spell as a whip in the dying days of John Major’s Government. He was charged with getting the deeply unpopular Maastricht Treaty though the Commons and earned the reputation of a bruiser.
“I didn’t want Maastricht either but I didn’t want the Government to fall, otherwise we would have got Maastricht without the monetary and social chapter optouts. I know I took no prisoners. But politics is a business where, frankly, you get enemies and I just have to live with that.”
There is another reason why Mr Davis, brought up as the son of a single mother on a South London council estate, is not universally liked.
Other Tory MPs from modest backgrounds are all too aware of class sensitivities which run through the party, and mind their manners. Mr Davis admits he is careless. “I am blind to it. I am very bad at judging people’s backgrounds. I just don’t see it,” he said.
Mr Davis is campaigning as a moderate One Nation Tory, with a promise to unify the party and help “the victims of state failure”.
However, many of the policies he plans to pursue are blatantly Thatcherite. His manifesto promises “simpler and lower taxes”, and he backs vouchers for schools and healthcare.
“The One Nation approach we are talking about is the original one. It is not what it has become to mean, a sort of left-wing thing. For me is is about having policies which are nominally right-wing — grounded in choice, freedom and autonomy, but designed to help everyone. The end is one nation, but the means is eclectic.”
Mr Davis believes that a strong social justice agenda is the key to repairing the party’s reputation with the public or, as Lord Ashcroft, the party’s donor puts it, its damaged brand.
It is central to his campaign and dominates the eight-page yellow and blue Modern Conservatives manifesto he publishes today.
However, he may disappoint prospective backers by admitting he would like to have Lynton Crosby, the Australian election strategist, back in the Tory camp at the next election.
Mr Crosby was blamed for the core vote strategy of the last election campaign which focused heavily on immigration. The party’s share of the vote barely increased.
“I Like Lynton and spoke to him just last week. I certainly would not rule out bringing him back. He is very direct and straightforward. But of course what we mustn’t do is rely on someone from another political culture to make the subtle judgements,” he said.
Party members, not MPs, will decide the outcome of the contest, after the failure of the leadership to change the rules. That has boosted the chances of Kenneth Clarke, the former Chancellor, who is unlikely to win a majority among MPs.
But Mr Davis’s supporters say rank and file members will take note of what happens in Westminster and will not pick a leader who does not command sufficient support in the Commons. Even after Mr Clarke’s “stylish” campaign launch, Mr Davis believes he is still ahead with the grass roots.
Mr Davis said he would revisit the leadership rules if he wins the contest, probably switching the roles of membership and MPs so that while the grass roots chose the shortlist, the backbenchers would make the final choice. A largely private man, Mr Davis said he is relieved that the last of his three children has just left home for university, given that he may soon be the the subject of relentless media attention.
His wife, Doreen, who runs his constituency office, may also have to get used to having every remark and outfit analysed.
Her picture makes a rare appearance in the manifesto. Is this a sign that she is ready for the role of leader’s wife?
“I would say she is mildly apprehensive,” Mr Davis said.
Mr Davis dismisses criticism that he is not enough of a party moderniser and will fail to convince the public the Tories have truly changed. “I am not anti-modernising. It is the nature of modernising that is important and for me that is about sticking adopting One Nation goals and sticking to them, no matter how much flak you get,” he said.
Among his 50 declared backers are numerous MPs who backed Michael Portillo, the arch moderniser, for the leadership in 2001, most notably David Willetts, one of the party’s leading intellectuals.
But they may be disappointed to discover that he is unconvinced that the Tories should embrace radical measures such as positive discrimination to boost the number of female MPs, as Labour did.
“There are programmes we started to get more women into Parliament that have never really been seen though, such as getting more of our women councillors to stand for election. We have a sizeable number and they already have the skills and the network they need. The problem with all-women shortlists is, apart from the justice of it, you get the Blair Babe syndrome where they end up being resented by their male colleagues.”
LIFE AND TIMES
Born: December 23, 1948
Education: Warwick University — BSc London Business School — MSc; Harvard Business School (AMP)
Jobs: Joined Tate & Lyle PLC in 1974, Strategic Planning Director — 1984-87, Director — 1987-89
Parliamentary Career: MP for Boothferry, 1987-97; MP for Haltemprice and Howden since 1997; assistant Whip 1990-93; Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office 1993-94; Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office 1994-97; party chairman, 2001-2002; Shadow Secretary of State for the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, 2002-03; Shadow Secretary of State for Home, Constitutional and Legal Affairs 2003-04; Shadow Home Secretary 2003-
Other: appointed chairman of the Conservatives in 1997 but sacked four years later by Iain Duncan Smith
WHAT HIS PREDECESSORS SAID WHEN THEY RAN FOR LEADER
“I will lead this party from its centre. I will call on the talents of all of the party and the party will expect all to answer that call. At its best, we have a party broad and generous, broad in appeal and generous in outlook — a party capable of representing all Britain and all Britons.”
Michael Howard, November 2003
“We know that women, ethnic minorities and people of different lifestyles must have greater opportunity within our party. And I shall do everything I can to give this effect...I will be intolerant of anyone who is intolerant of others.”
Iain Duncan Smith, October 2001
“Our watchwords, therefore, will be openness and tolerance. The Conservative Party I lead will welcome people into its ranks regardless of their colour, race, creed or sexuality.”
William Hague, January 1998
