Sebastian Payne is Director of Onward, Martyn Rose is co-founder and trustee Chair of Onward.
Renewal is one of the Conservative Party’s most natural instincts. Very often, our opponents find the agility of policy and leadership reinvention mind-boggling, almost political gravity defying. But it has proven time and over to be the party’s most enduring virtue. Conservatism by its very nature is a creed that adapts to the times it serves. We have reached an inflection moment where times and country are rapidly changing. Now the party must do the same.
With a decade having passed since the party returned to power, the Conservatives must not stand still if the party is to meet the impending challenge of a fifth historic general election victory. In the wake of the Ukraine war and the pandemic, the atmospherics are far from fortuitous. Yet the recent successes of Rishi Sunak speak not only to that tested formula of competent administration, but also the virtues of adapting policy to the challenges of the present era.
For historians of the distant future, 2016 will no doubt prove the most decisive moment in modern political history. Not merely for delivering Brexit, but for the electoral realignment that has taken place in its wake. As the referendum shook up traditional voting allegiances, the Conservatives’ voting coalition has expanded to include many parts of the country that were traditionally well beyond our reach. Britain’s political life will eventually be classified as BB and AB: Before Brexit and After Brexit.
It was in this After Brexit milieu that Onward was founded; to meet the desire for fresh thinking and ideas on the centre right. We sit equidistant between academia and journalism – more thorough than the latter, more accessible than the former. We seek to bring a modernising lens to policy dilemmas while remaining true to the best core centre right principles: an active but agile state, supported by low taxes and a dynamic market economy that prioritises social fabric, cohesion and the role of communities and the family.
Be it the analysis of Workington Man, which underpinned the 2019 election victory, the opportunities Net Zero will provide in the Red Wall, the importance of the politics of belonging, or what levelling up looks like in practice, our research has worked to shape the most important debates in Westminster and Whitehall. But as the next election campaign comes into view, some of our most ambitious work is beginning.
Onward will celebrate its fifth birthday in May and we are delighted to be hosting the Future of Conservatism commission. Led by Gavin Rice and Nick Timothy, the project will produce three major research papers over the next year making the case for the next stage of modernisation over the decade or so to come — defining the intellectual, economic and social argument for a new form of conservatism. We believe passionately that the Conservative Party needs to lean into the post-2016 realignment, not shy away from it.
The Future of Conservatism project’s work will be guided by a steering group of the brightest minds on the centre right. Chaired by the Levelling Up secretary Michael Gove, we are thrilled to be working with the Tees Valley Mayor, Ben Houchen, ministers Neil O’Brien, Laura Trott and Claire Couthino, plus MPs Danny Kruger, David Johnston, John Lamont and Miriam Cates. The steering group also includes some of the most exciting thinkers from the wider conservative movement – including the writers Juliet Samuel and Tomiwa Owolade, the pollster James Kanagasooriam, the academic Michael Lind, Baroness McGregor-Smith – and the editor of this very publication.
The Future of Conservatism will set out what so many are seeking from the party today: vision. The project will define the values and ideas that we must take to thrive in the 2020s and beyond. In short, what everyone involved believes is that the bet made under Boris Johnson’s leadership was correct – that the post-Brexit realignment is real, that it can’t be undone, that for the party to prosper it needs to be a truly national force.
For the Conservative Party to succeed in this new electoral environment is to seize the opportunity to speak to all parts of the country. Too often, the electorate is pitted into unhelpful divides: north versus south, red wall and blue wall. Too often different voters are painted as if they belong to two different countries and electorates. But it is only a broad-church centre right party that has the ability to speak to everyone.
The conservatism we aim to define is about providing leadership based on a politics in the pursuit of the common good. We must stand for everyone: the young and the old, urban and rural, those who think of themselves as Conservative and those who don’t. In short it means pioneering a new spirit of national community – where the economic and social are closely woven together in the spirit party’s finrest traditions. It is also about stronger and fairer growth. As we saw with the Prime Minister’s success with the Windsor Framework, last month’s Budget and the recent strategies to deal with antisocial behaviour and the small boats issue, pragmatic conservatism is back. We will provide the vision that can take it into the next election.
But the Future of Conservatism’s work will go beyond the next 18 months and research papers. We will be hosting a series of public debates in conjunction with our friends at UnHerd – bringing in voices from across the party and the wider Conservative community to debate everything from industrial policy and achieving energy security, to the importance of national security and the role of civic society, national belonging and place. We hope you will join us at these events, virtually or in person, and have a voice in where the party is heading.
This is far from all we are doing. Onward’s ambitious research programme will continue alongside the Future of Conservative commission – in areas such as levelling up, where we will build on our strengths and looking at where it should go next, and science and tech where we are expanding our remit into new frontiers, and with energy security, where the debate on delivering net zero must ensure affordable and secure supply.
Onward was at the core of the party’s last reinvention after Brexit and we hope to be so again. The Conservatives are at our best when we acknowledge the need to renew, and renew again. It is not an admission of failure, but a show of strength, to accept that the ideas and principles of 2010 are markedly different from those of 2023 and 2024. A new chapter is being written in the party’s history and Onward will provide the arguments and knowhow to renew the country’s faith in our ideas.
Sebastian Payne is Director of Onward, Martyn Rose is co-founder and trustee Chair of Onward.
Renewal is one of the Conservative Party’s most natural instincts. Very often, our opponents find the agility of policy and leadership reinvention mind-boggling, almost political gravity defying. But it has proven time and over to be the party’s most enduring virtue. Conservatism by its very nature is a creed that adapts to the times it serves. We have reached an inflection moment where times and country are rapidly changing. Now the party must do the same.
With a decade having passed since the party returned to power, the Conservatives must not stand still if the party is to meet the impending challenge of a fifth historic general election victory. In the wake of the Ukraine war and the pandemic, the atmospherics are far from fortuitous. Yet the recent successes of Rishi Sunak speak not only to that tested formula of competent administration, but also the virtues of adapting policy to the challenges of the present era.
For historians of the distant future, 2016 will no doubt prove the most decisive moment in modern political history. Not merely for delivering Brexit, but for the electoral realignment that has taken place in its wake. As the referendum shook up traditional voting allegiances, the Conservatives’ voting coalition has expanded to include many parts of the country that were traditionally well beyond our reach. Britain’s political life will eventually be classified as BB and AB: Before Brexit and After Brexit.
It was in this After Brexit milieu that Onward was founded; to meet the desire for fresh thinking and ideas on the centre right. We sit equidistant between academia and journalism – more thorough than the latter, more accessible than the former. We seek to bring a modernising lens to policy dilemmas while remaining true to the best core centre right principles: an active but agile state, supported by low taxes and a dynamic market economy that prioritises social fabric, cohesion and the role of communities and the family.
Be it the analysis of Workington Man, which underpinned the 2019 election victory, the opportunities Net Zero will provide in the Red Wall, the importance of the politics of belonging, or what levelling up looks like in practice, our research has worked to shape the most important debates in Westminster and Whitehall. But as the next election campaign comes into view, some of our most ambitious work is beginning.
Onward will celebrate its fifth birthday in May and we are delighted to be hosting the Future of Conservatism commission. Led by Gavin Rice and Nick Timothy, the project will produce three major research papers over the next year making the case for the next stage of modernisation over the decade or so to come — defining the intellectual, economic and social argument for a new form of conservatism. We believe passionately that the Conservative Party needs to lean into the post-2016 realignment, not shy away from it.
The Future of Conservatism project’s work will be guided by a steering group of the brightest minds on the centre right. Chaired by the Levelling Up secretary Michael Gove, we are thrilled to be working with the Tees Valley Mayor, Ben Houchen, ministers Neil O’Brien, Laura Trott and Claire Couthino, plus MPs Danny Kruger, David Johnston, John Lamont and Miriam Cates. The steering group also includes some of the most exciting thinkers from the wider conservative movement – including the writers Juliet Samuel and Tomiwa Owolade, the pollster James Kanagasooriam, the academic Michael Lind, Baroness McGregor-Smith – and the editor of this very publication.
The Future of Conservatism will set out what so many are seeking from the party today: vision. The project will define the values and ideas that we must take to thrive in the 2020s and beyond. In short, what everyone involved believes is that the bet made under Boris Johnson’s leadership was correct – that the post-Brexit realignment is real, that it can’t be undone, that for the party to prosper it needs to be a truly national force.
For the Conservative Party to succeed in this new electoral environment is to seize the opportunity to speak to all parts of the country. Too often, the electorate is pitted into unhelpful divides: north versus south, red wall and blue wall. Too often different voters are painted as if they belong to two different countries and electorates. But it is only a broad-church centre right party that has the ability to speak to everyone.
The conservatism we aim to define is about providing leadership based on a politics in the pursuit of the common good. We must stand for everyone: the young and the old, urban and rural, those who think of themselves as Conservative and those who don’t. In short it means pioneering a new spirit of national community – where the economic and social are closely woven together in the spirit party’s finrest traditions. It is also about stronger and fairer growth. As we saw with the Prime Minister’s success with the Windsor Framework, last month’s Budget and the recent strategies to deal with antisocial behaviour and the small boats issue, pragmatic conservatism is back. We will provide the vision that can take it into the next election.
But the Future of Conservatism’s work will go beyond the next 18 months and research papers. We will be hosting a series of public debates in conjunction with our friends at UnHerd – bringing in voices from across the party and the wider Conservative community to debate everything from industrial policy and achieving energy security, to the importance of national security and the role of civic society, national belonging and place. We hope you will join us at these events, virtually or in person, and have a voice in where the party is heading.
This is far from all we are doing. Onward’s ambitious research programme will continue alongside the Future of Conservative commission – in areas such as levelling up, where we will build on our strengths and looking at where it should go next, and science and tech where we are expanding our remit into new frontiers, and with energy security, where the debate on delivering net zero must ensure affordable and secure supply.
Onward was at the core of the party’s last reinvention after Brexit and we hope to be so again. The Conservatives are at our best when we acknowledge the need to renew, and renew again. It is not an admission of failure, but a show of strength, to accept that the ideas and principles of 2010 are markedly different from those of 2023 and 2024. A new chapter is being written in the party’s history and Onward will provide the arguments and knowhow to renew the country’s faith in our ideas.