The worst has happened: The ‘nasty party’ brand is now an asset

Britain, both now and in May, had a perceived choice: an incompetent lamb, or a competent lion. By that, I mean, Labour as a nice and kind brand but disdained, bumbling bank managers, or the Tories, a nasty brand, but prestigious and efficient bank managers. Given the superbly efficient Tory narrative of “not handing the keys back to those that crashed the car”, given the lacklustre Labour response, given the fragile recovery, and given widespread insecurity, Britain chose the latter.

And for the time being, they will continue to do so; such is the climate of post-crisis Britain. Competence and the economy are our most salient issues.

This is why the Tories are in such a position they can now use their greatest perceived weakness –their nasty brand – as a weapon. If you believe the dead cat theory attributed to Cameron’s comments last week, the strategy seems to go as such: the Tories say something so nasty, so in-keeping with their brand, so stereotypical, so impossible for us not to gasp at, and so absolutely distracting, that the nastiness is now an intentional weapon. A Tory says something gasp-worthy, and they avoid headlines on their initial problem. A dead cat does not have to be objectively nasty, but it helps. And most importantly, it triggers outrage in our ranks.

And because the public will always choose the lion over the lamb, they can afford to flaunt the nasty party brand so conspicuously and without shame, without a fear that voters will be turned off and turn to the bumbling bank managers. It is why Cameron could call child refugees “a bunch of migrants”. It’s why Fallon could say Ed Miliband “stabbed his brother in the back”, and, implications abound, that he would ‘betray the country’. There is no fallout, not anymore. Unless Twitter counts – which it does not.

They are also exploiting the climate with it. While the ‘nasty party’ of scandal and sleaze had no place in a hopeful nineties, the Tories’ use now of fear and imminent security threats – refugees, immigration, ISIS, turbulent markets, Trident, Ed Miliband – work a treat in post-crisis Britain that faces a globalised, competitive, dangerous world where just beyond our shores seem to be ‘hordes’ or ‘swarms of migrants’. If anything, these dead cats are popular, their brand of nastiness has become popular. Or, at least, populist.  

Immigration has always been high on the priorities of voters, and this certainly has not always been inherently xenophobic. But now it’s a security threat, and the Tories can chuck all the dead cats out into the ether to feed this growing sentiment of a country increasingly fearful of the outside world.

The Left asks where the dignity is in this. Cameron is a statesman, how can be bring himself into such disregard? How can he be so irresponsible? He brings his office to shame.

There is nothing dignified in this: it is the mark of a weak leader who continuously finds himself in situations that require amoral, xenophobic, sexist, classist, prejudiced, bigoted dead cats to be slammed on the table. But that doesn’t matter. It is the sign of a good politician. Dignity, kindness, compassion, they come second in these politics the Tories have made, and a politics Labour fail to compete against.

Labour’s inability to rise to parity on competence, or see that its good brand is considered a priority on par, is why this new era in party politics is so incredibly limiting for us. We can neither recreate the dead cat strategy – it is not in keeping with the brand, and is simply not in the nature of us as the Left – or challenge it efficiently. Equally, it is in the Left’s, one would so merited, nature that they would instinctively act with disdain and outrage to comments like this.

But this is what the Tories want. They know the Left and understand its machinations. They know we will be involuntarily outraged and express said outrage, to prove our perceived kindness. And thus this will distract from our line of attack and the Tories’ Mistake of The Day, as with Google, as with non-doms. The Right understand the Left; the Left do not understand the Right. Or rather, the Left do not understand the ‘Crosbyites’.

Labour’s worst fears have been realised, its last line of defence has fallen: the Tory ‘nasty party’ brand is now the dead cat, the brand has been weaponised against us.