DOWNING Street has brushed aside suggestions that Theresa May should cheer up after Ruth Davidson claimed the Tory Government came across as “dour” and “joyless”.
The Scottish Conservative leader’s appeal for her party to be more optimistic to attract younger voters came at the launch of a new campaign group, Onward, whose aim is to come up with policies to get the under-40s to vote Conservative at the next General Election.
Research has shown that only nine per cent of 25 to 39-year-olds said they would vote Conservative at the 2022 poll.
Addressing the launch of Onward at Westminster alongside fellow Scot Michael Gove, the Environment Secretary, Ms Davidson said: “Too often, Conservatives end up, well, a bit dour. Authoritarian. Just a tad joyless. A party that sounds like its only pitch is like those hectoring signs you see on the tube: Please Stand on the Right.
“If there’s one thing we’ve learnt in Scotland, it’s that when you fight for what you believe, people listen but it’s when you do it with a smile that people really get behind you,” added Ms Davidson, who attended the Political Cabinet in Downing Street but did not raise the issue at the early morning meeting.
Mr Gove also noted at the launch event: “Sometimes in the past we have seemed censorious and finger-wagging, pessimistic and unhappy, uncomfortable that we seem to be living in the 21st century when the Fifties would be far more attractive.”
He then quipped: “And what a pity that the 19th century isn’t an option!”
No 10 said the issue of Ms Davidson’s remarks about the Government being dour were also not discussed at the full Cabinet, which took place after the political session.
Asked what the PM’s response would be to her colleague’s suggestion that she ran a dour administration, her spokesman replied: “Look at the action the Government is taking in its priority areas, delivering Brexit, which the British public voted for but also focusing on priorities such as a long-term plan for the NHS, providing opportunities for more people to get that first foot on the housing ladder, delivering changes to environmental policy which will leave the environment in a better state than which the Government found it.”
Asked again about the charge of dourness, the spokesman said: “Look, these are important priorities and we are delivering[them] on behalf of the British people and you have found people clearly enthused by our action in areas such as housing and the environment.”
But when asked if Mrs May should cheer up in her messages to the public, given she was dubbed a “glum-bucket” during the 2017 election campaign, the spokesman chuckled and responded by saying: “Next.”
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