On Tuesday, from a conference stage in Birmingham, four candidates will make their pitches to lead the Conservative party. Their immediate challenge after the Tory rout this summer will be to reinvigorate a hugely demoralised set of MPs and members. Starting on Sunday, the annual gathering of the Tory faithful – the first in 14 years to be held from opposition – is expected to be a low-key affair. The evening schedule, ordinarily packed with corporate receptions, is sparse. Businesses and lobbyists are either making cursory visits for a day or two or skipping the event entirely. Rishi Sunak is attending on Sunday only and will not make a speech. Former MPs who lost their seats in July are also staying away. “I checked in with a bunch of sane people and none seemed to be going,” one former minister remarked. Even among current Conservative MPs there is little enthusiasm for any of the four candidates vying for the Tory crown. According to ConservativeHome, less than half the parliamentary party – 55 of 121 MPs – have openly declared who they support. In the latest round of voting this month, Robert Jenrick had 33 backers among MPs, followed by Kemi Badenoch with 28. James Cleverly and Tom Tugendhat each had 21. This tight parliamentary party race contrasts with 2019, where Boris Johnson surged ahead of his rivals, and the 2022 contest, where Rishi Sunak did (before members chose Liz Truss). “We’re going to go into a conference where no one is streets ahead,” a Tory source said. “The MPs aren’t convinced by anyone. I don’t think the members are either.” Demonstrating their popularity with the Conservative grassroots at conference will be a core objective for all four candidates, although only a tiny minority of party members attend the gathering. Campaign strategists are busy brainstorming ways to ensure that long queues form outside fringe events where their candidate is speaking, with one typical tactic being to book too small a room. If any candidate is proved to be the members’ darling, Tory MPs will come under pressure to vote that person through to the final stage.
The message that contenders broadcast from conference are also key. So far, leadership hopefuls have been reticent to attack Johnson or Truss, who are seen as popular with the grassroots. But according to internal polling carried out by one campaign and seen by the Guardian, candidates may in fact benefit from distancing themselves from the chaos of past administrations. When asked what they thought was responsible for their election defeat, nearly a quarter of Tory members cited Johnson and Partygate and Truss’s premiership as among the key factors. For Conservative campaign headquarters (CCHQ), the objectives for this conference are clear: to raise cash and minimise the potential for infighting and acrimony. But the resulting format has fostered resentment in some of the leadership contenders’ camps. Candidates have been told they must seek permission for any broadcast appearances, and have been tasked with spending specified periods in the Tory donors’ lounge. Their speeches are limited to 20 minutes – lengthened from 10 minutes after uproar. “There has been a degree of discontentment about attempts being made by CCHQ to curtail the opportunity of anyone to do anything of substance and members’ ability to properly judge candidates,” one leadership campaign source said. “They’re trying to fill up all the candidates’ time completely with hobnobbing with their donors.” There is also growing frustration among party insiders who think the extended contest is self-indulgent and politically damaging. “It feels like four people are competing to be the head of deckchairs on the Titanic,” another Tory source said. “Labour is getting away with murder as we are spending our conference talking to ourselves about ourselves. We do not have a party leader in place so there is a lack of effective opposition to the budget [on 30 October] and we are missing the moment to capitalise while Labour wobble.” David Davis, who went up against David Cameron in the 2005 Tory leadership contest after a similar party conference “beauty parade”, said conditions in the UK now were like 1975. “That’s about the last time the country faced such a complex of problems – world trade fracturing, the Middle East unbelievably unstable, the health service not working, unions flexing their muscles again,” he said. “The only time I can remember anything like this is when we installed Margaret Thatcher as leader. What will matter is not so much the flamboyance and flimflam of speeches at conference as what ideas the candidates will bring.” A week after listening to those ideas on Tuesday, Tory MPs will whittle down the list of leadership hopefuls from four to two. The winner will be chosen on 2 November in a vote by party members. “What usually happens is the Tory membership elects someone that they really like and then they have a clash with reality. The public are clearly really, really fed up with the Tories right now and there’s a huge mountain to climb for whoever wins,” a former Conservative special adviser said. “The candidates will play to the audience in front of them – but they must not lose sight of the fact that they also need to win over the country.”