As David Cameron learned to his cost over Brexit, voters don’t judge politicians on policy, they judge on results
Henry Hill is deputy editor of ConservativeHome
The government’s current position on the Rwanda scheme is unlikely to boost its electoral hopes – and to understand why, we should look to David Cameron and a particular pre-Brexit failure. Cast your mind back to the moment the former Tory prime minister’s renegotiated deal for our EU membership “exploded on the launchpad” ahead of the referendum. He and his team had worked very, very hard. While they hadn’t got what they had set out to gain, the deal they came back with (the “emergency break” on EU migration) felt like a significant achievement. Perhaps it was, amid the constraints imposed on him in Brussels.
But voters don’t grade politicians on effort, they judge by results. And compared with what they wanted – and indeed, what Cameron had promised – the terms he came back with were entirely inadequate. Instead of a definite end to freedom of movement, there was a time-limited and arcane mechanism that might never have been used at all. What was supposed to be the foundation of his referendum campaign turned into a self-inflicted disaster.
