Tory leadership race
July 17th, 2001
A letter to the Daily Telegraph which was published on 17th July 2001.
Mr Portillo’s preoccupation with minorities is almost exactly what the vast majority of ordinary voters are sick of. The drop of six million in the Conservative vote between 1992 and 2001 is greater than all the minorities combined.
Kenneth Clarke is opposed to the settled views of 85 per cent of his own party and 70 per cent of the electorate on the most fundamental issue of the day.
Mr Duncan Smith represents a chance to wrench the political agenda away from the liberal metropolitan consensus that caricatures any steps of national self-preservation as xenophobic, racist or “unacceptably Right-wing”.