What the voters want...

Nick Dixon interviews Pete North and finds Pete's prolific writing has left him fully charged and ready to . go...

"...I arrived where I am politically through a process of elimination. Populism doesn't work in Britain. Conservatism does. Moreover, National Conservatism is the right answer. Populism offers nothing but empty slogans and false hope, white conservatism is innate to the British psyche. It's who we are. There is no point trying to reinvent the wheel. We just have to popularise the ideas. 

To start with though, we need to ensure we're all on the same page. We are all agreed that "one nation" wet Toryism is not conservatism. We are not social democrats. We are not liberal internationalists. We believe in the nation state, the rule of law, free enterprise, individual liberty, and the family as the basis of thriving community.

But specifically, we are not free market liberals nor free trade fanatics either. National conservatism recognises the necessity to defend Britain's strategic industrial interests, and that a diverse economy, able to arm and feed itself, is paramount to Britain's resilience and national defence.  

As such, we reject the hyper-liberal ideas of the ERG, IEA and ASI. The conservatism of today must be relevant to our times. It cannot and must not be reheated Thatcherism. Thatcher was the antidote to past-war socialism. Modern conservatism must address itself to correcting the evils of neoliberalism - the dispersal of power to post-democratic constructs, open borders, and deindustrialisation - recognising that post-Brexit, post-globalisation Britain exists in a multipolar world that can no longer rely on the US defence umbrella, nor can it continue to open its borders to trade with its enemies.

The conservatism of today must recognise the growing threats to national democracy from within. Specifically, the lawfare of globalist ideologues and the rise of political Islam, which is colonising urban politics. As a conservative we reject racial bigotry, but are sworn to defend Britain as a culturally Christian homeland, for that is the only foundation for Britain's continued existence as a functioning society where all are equal under the law. We reject the dogmas of multiculturalism and cultural relativism.

This is the basis upon which the next iteration of conservatism must build. I have no preference for what happens at the coming election. The Tory party will rightly be punished for its betrayal of conservatism, but it won't be wiped out. It will continue to exist as the primary opposition, as an institution of our dysfunctional duopoly. We may wish it were some other way, but we have to deal with the world as we find it and use the tools at our disposal. 

The scale of the task is awesome, but it can and will be done, because it can be no other way. The tide is going out on the globalists and neoliberals. This is their final chapter. We must be ready with ideas for the time when their regime falls. The work to ensure the primacy of those ideas begins now.