The string of defections from the Conservatives to Reform has intensified both the schism on the right of politics and the debate over what to do about it. Prosper UK, the new group launched by Sir Andy Street and Baroness Ruth Davidson, argue that the Tories should occupy the moderate centre ground. Others assert that the only way to dislodge Labour is to “unite the right” through some kind of accommodation with Reform. Where should the Conservatives position themselves in the multiparty political landscape? Analysis of my recent polling points to some answers.
Published polling regularly shows the right’s combined vote share to be in the mid-40s – surely enough to oust Labour and install a Tory-Reform administration with a comfortable majority if only the two sets of supporters could be brought together. But even if the personalities could agree and the internal politics navigated (big enough ifs in themselves) would this hypothetical alliance be as big as the sum of its parts?
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