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Tories tired of losing to Blair

Fed up with losing to British Prime Minister Tony Blair's Labour Party, the once-mighty Conservatives are hunting for a leader who can conjure up some winning magic again.

The party, led in the past by icons such as Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher, ruled Britain for most of the 20th century but has suffered three straight electoral poundings.

Starting today at the Conservatives' annual conference in Blackpool, northwest England, five rivals will lay out their vision to take the right-of-center party back to power.

One of them should be crowned party leader on Dec. 6.

On top of finding a compelling new leader, the Conservatives must also carve out a modern election-winning plan, say experts -- including Blair himself.

"They have got to work out where they are in the modern world today," Blair said. "They can choose whichever leader they want but until they've worked that out, it's a bit like the Labour Party in the 1980s, they won't get it right."

Beating blair

Blair found the magic formula by reforming the ideologically leftist Labour Party with a fresh, pragmatic brand of economic policies that captured the center ground from the Conservatives.

The prime minister's "New Labour" won a landslide victory in 1997 and have kept a comfortable grip on power ever since.

"Blair is a brilliant political strategist. He's stolen the Conservatives' clothes," George Jones, emeritus professor of government at the London School of Economics, said.

"This presents the Conservatives with a pretty impossible case -- and what Blair would like them to do is go further to the right," he said.

Such a move is tempting as fringe parties have gnawed away at the Conservatives' right while the Liberal Democrats have won over some voters who wonder what the Tories now stand for.

Stuck in opposition

Current leader Michael Howard -- due to step down at the end of the conference -- believes the party needs an economic slump to beat Labour.

"When most people are relatively content with their economic lot, it is very hard for an opposition to win elections," he told the Daily Telegraph newspaper.

In the running to replace Howard and become the party's fifth leader since 1997 are a former military tough guy, a cigar-smoking bruiser back for one last battle, a smart young gun, a wily old timer and a smooth talker.

Each will lay out their battle plan for ejecting Labour from the middle class market towns and prosperous city suburbs that the Conservatives used to dominate under Thatcher in the 1980s.

Backed by plenty of arm-twisting and sniping on the conference fringe, one of the five could swing the leadership battle their way once voting starts in the middle of this month.

A former part-time reservist in the army's elite Special Air Service, David Davis, 56, the Conservatives' internal affairs spokesman, is the early front-runner for the crown.

Experienced veteran Kenneth Clarke, 65, the beer-loving and cigar-smoking former finance minister, is having a third tilt at the leadership.

Youthful education critic and eager modernizer David Cameron, 38, is also a strong contender.

Malcolm Rifkind, 59, a former foreign secretary, and smooth-talking foreign affairs spokesman Liam Fox, 44, are also standing.

The candidates differ in their approach and policies, but all seem agreed that the party needs a fundamental refit.
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