Seeking to capitalise on Labour blunders and better poll ratings, Conservative leader David Cameron this week moved further into his social agenda pitch. Having dealt with immigration, he moved onto the subject of rape, again indicating disturbing statistics. But what is behind Cameron’s spectre of social meltdown, and is it just too much to believe?
Flushed with success after a positive reception to his speech on immigration, the Conservative leader this week spoke on another emotive social issue. At the Conservative Women’s Organisation, Mr Cameron indicated that on rape, England and Wales have the lowest conviction rates in leading European countries, 5.7%. He made a pledge for longer-term funding for rape crisis centres, also calling for a “widespread cultural change” in a society which in his view has become overly “sexualised” in the last decade.
Mr Cameron said: "Studies have shown that as many as one in two young men believe there are some circumstances when it's okay to force a woman to have sex. ...To my mind, this is an example of moral collapse." During the speech, he called for better sex education in schools and announced a Tory review of spending.
Hot on the heels of this speech, news broke of yet another Home Office blunder. This time it emerged through documents leaked to a newspaper that 5,000 illegal immigrants had been cleared to work in security (including at airports and ports) with the full knowledge of the Home Secretary. Jacqui Smith, who had reportedly known of the situation since July, held an emergency briefing in the Commons defending the decision not to publicise the information and denying charges of cover-up.
Countering loud Conservative criticism, she said her priority had been to establish the "full nature and scale" of the problem and to take action to deal with it, "rather than immediately to put incomplete and potentially misleading information into the public domain." In reply, Shadow Home Secretary David Davis scoffed, “The response from the Home Office so far has been blunder, panic and cover-up.”
So, as it turned out for Mr Cameron, the illegal immigrants fiasco ultimately deprived him of any forthcoming praise and debate on the issue of rape and sentencing. The loss, however, was somewhat alleviated by points scored against the Home Office, and presumably the Conservative marketing machine will soon hit upon another example of “moral collapse” to throw at Labour. Perhaps next they will look again at antisocial behaviour, or even put Ian Duncan-Smith and the newly-returned Jonathan Aitken to work digging up frightful government failures and Tory initiatives on the prisons system.
The current Conservative strategy reminds us, sadly, of what politics is all about. Mr Cameron, like any ruthless newspaper editor, realises that instilling fear with information bestows power and demands approval. Identifying wide ranging threats and promoting the view of a society in meltdown, he hopes, will lead people to gather under his banner and reject Gordon Brown’s Labour Party. But being in opposition is a far cry from being in office, and although some people may accept Cameron’s social commentary to a degree, others will view it is as political opportunism and panic-mongering.
