Everyone’s a critic

Out of the failure to run the country efficiently emerges a light blue phoenix with a pint of beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other, chuckling menacingly. (Tim Stanley, Telegraph, May 2, 2025)

I’m not going to add to the many words that have been written about last week’s local elections.

Nor am I going to jump on the Reform/Farage bandwagon because my position hasn’t changed - I’m still Team Kemi, for a number of reasons.

Badenoch deserves a full parliament as leader of the Opposition and I deplore those within the Conservative Party who would ditch her in favour of one of the leadership candidates she defeated only six months ago - two of whom have chosen not to serve in her shadow cabinet.

For what it’s worth, I believe she is absolutely right to take a slowly slowly approach to announcing new policies, and those who demand instant gratification at the ballot box are not only pathetic, they fail to understand the reality of the dire situation Badenoch inherited.

Rebuilding the Conservative Party and regaining the trust of the electorate will take years not months because there is rarely a quick fix following a devastating election defeat.

As Badenoch herself has pointed out, Labour were in opposition for 18 years from 1979 to 1997. The Tories were then out of government for 13 years (1997-2010), and after that Labour were in opposition for another 14 years, and it could have been longer.

In 2019, following the Boris ‘landslide’, most people expected Labour to be out of power for a further decade at least. But then came Covid and everything changed.

I accept there were other factors, including Dominic Cummings detonating a series of controlled explosions within Downing Street, followed by Liz Truss arguably destroying any remaining public confidence in the Tories, but whole books have been written about that tumultuous period so best to start there.

As a football supporter I’ve watched as it has become the norm to change the manager after a few bad results. Does it help the team or the club? Sometimes, but more often than not it leads to instability and long-term failure.

Politics shouldn’t be like that but, increasingly, it is.

What I really can’t stand are the anonymous briefings and articles. One of the worst, ‘Badenoch must go’, was published by The Critic in February, just three months after she was elected leader of the party, and credited to a ‘Senior Source’.

How brave.

At least some commentators and activists have the courage to put their names to such attacks, but what I dislike about some is the sneering arrogance, sometimes bordering on contempt.

I won’t name names because one or two have attended Forest events and I don’t dislike them personally, but they clearly think they’re cleverer than the leader of the Opposition.

Perhaps they are, but every time I read their too-clever-by-half criticism I’m reminded of Hemingway’s quote:

Critics are men who watch a battle from a high place then come down and shoot the survivors.

Everyone’s a critic, as someone else once said, because it’s easy to criticise.

If you’re really interested in politics and want to make a difference, stand for office and see if you can do better. I’m pretty sure most critics can’t, and won’t.

Meanwhile, I agree with almost every word of this:

Are the Tories really mad enough to change their leader again? (Spectator)

Update: Tory MPs to meet to discuss ousting Kemi Badenoch ‘before it is too late’ (Independent)

Again, no names. Despicable.