How should the Tories build on their excellent current approval ratings, to position themselves optimally for a 2015 election?

[longfingernails]

Thanks to Cameron's uncharacteristic show of courage, the Tories are ending 2011 in the ascendency.

My first suggestions:

• Engineer a showdown with the European Court of Human Rights over prisoner voting; if we can leave then all the better.
• Continue raising the lower income tax threshold.
• Make any taxpayer funding of any trade union activity illegal.
• Turbocharge the Gove reforms; the more the NUT and NASUWT squeal the better.
• Abandon High Speed 2 and invest in dozens of small suburban rail projects in marginal constituencies instead.
• Put Jeremy Browne in charge of Business (he seems like a genuinely deregulatory Lib Dem who will cut red tape); move the Stalinist Cable to the essentially non-job of the Environment once, as seems likely according to current reports, Chris Huhne gets prosecuted.
• Get rid of the 50p tax rate for all those who can prove that they generate at least 3 other downstream jobs; they have similar systems I think in America (at least in some states)
• Sack Ken Clarke and Crispin Blunt, get some real conservatives in the MOJ; a good opportunity to promote some of the 2010 intake.
• Above all, continue doing things which makes the Guardian, the large Mumsnet contingent who parrot Polly Toynbee's every word, and Guardian TV (aka the BBC) "froth" in Islington dinner party rage.

Any more ideas?

Perhaps DC could drown some kittens live on TV?

Good to see you back, LFN. I missed you

Burn a few foreigners
Flog some criminals
Bring back public executions
Make parking offences subject to capital punishment
Cut income tax just before the election
Abolish voting rights for the under 50s

Ooh I've got loads of ideas

create a super-estate where they can dump all the single mums and disabled people and airdrop a few food supplies in once a month. surround it with armed guards and don't let the scum out.

legalise domestic violence.

abolish women's right to vote or own property.

make reporting rape a crime.

abolish voting rights for anyone who studied social sciences or who works in health, education or care.

ban higher education for the working classes - oh they kind of did that one already.....

Oooh, it's only another 3 years of them after next week, isn't it? Obviously they can make a right mess of just about everything important in that time, but still a cheering reminder I feel.

Hi tethersend

Drowning kittens will not be popular, unlike pretty much all the suggestions above.

Thanks to the public's utter lack of faith in the economic competence of Ed Balls, and in Red Ed's leadership capabilities in any way, shape or form, whatsoever, the fundamental arguments are all in the Tories' favour. They have made the right strategic start in their first two years (though they have been far too timid in so many ways); they now need to cement this excellent start by creating new conservative voters.

One of the very best ways is to open new Free Schools and Academies. Everyone who chooses such a school will know that the Labour party (now that the Blairites are dead, and despite Steven Twigg's best assurances to the contrary) detests the idea of parents having full choice in their children's education. That means they have a very strong incentive to vote Tory. Free schools have the potential to become the "buy your council house" policy of this generation.

Michael Gove has been, by far and away, the most impressive of the Tory Cabinet, apart from Osborne, perhaps. Iain Duncan Smith will have his chance to claim this mantle over the next few years as the reform of the bloated welfare state begins to kick in though.

The Tories need to find far more "hooks" like the Gove free schools. If you can make floating voters into sticky voters, then you can win elections.

they did that last time - those floaty voters will have gotten their feet firmly back on the ground by next time.

mind you they didn't even 'stick' enough of them to win outright last time did they.

"Thanks to the public's utter lack of faith in the economic competence of Ed Balls, and in Red Ed's leadership capabilities in any way, shape or form, whatsoever, the fundamental arguments are all in the Tories' favour."

Come now, LFN- surely you're not suggesting that the Tories' popularity is due to the lack of a decent opposition? I thought it was down to their courage?

You've changed.

Then, the Tories were in opposition.

They screwed up the general election leadup and campaign badly, but fortunately, the electoral calculus was almost exactly perfect for the formation of the coalition. A few more Tory seats and they would have never contemplated a coalition; a few less and the rainbow coalition might have become a serious possibility.

Now, they are in government, and they need to use the levers of power in every possible way to create more Tory voters (and I suppose, to a lesser extent, Lib Dems).

A 'bleak' forecast for the economy, U/E rising. Yep, Gideon is doing a fine Tory-job on the economy. Rarely do we see the like of LFN's myopic meaness.
Missed you like toothache.

tethersend I honestly thought that the Tories (at least Cameron) had no courage whatsoever, until his little bulldog display in Brussels. I still don't trust Cameron one bit - but the Tories have no-one better for leadership material at the moment.

Still, at least they have one semi-human in charge. Look at Labour - Brown, followed by Red Ed... and they even boo their 3 time election winner Blair at their conference!

No argument from me on the Labour leadership- but you seem to be implying that the Tories' popularity is due to the lack of credible opposition; do you really mean that?

I honestly thought you thought more of them than that.

Sorry, you've lost me. Who is this semi-human?

What could the Tories do? Well, carry on removing benefit scroungers poor people from expensive properties, aka gerrymandering, will be a good start.

Kind of agree with you about the Opposition though . Some policies would be nice.

yes, it was an error not have the other brother as 'leader', but it won't make too much difference at the next election.

tethersend No - I am not a Tory, I am a small c-conservative who prefers a lot of UKIP policy but recognises that the only realistic way for conservative ideas to be enacted is through the Tory party.

I think a lot of individual Tories are doing a good job, but collectively, the party failed to inspire at the last general election. I have warmed to them a lot over the last couple of months, but no doubt some other massive disappointment with them looms large.

Scarletbanner I agree that the sooner the 30th percentile capped at £400/week rule for HB kicks in, the better.

Though if the Tories continue to impress in the months ahead, I might even consider an idea I have flirted with, on and off, for several years: to join the local party and run as a councillor!

Please do, LFN. Please, please do.

The prospect is exciting but I suspect, as always, I will chicken out - politics must be absolute hell on family, even at local council level. Not sure I am made of the right stuff!

But maybe I could at least help Boris trounce Ken in the mayoral election... I strongly disapprove of some of Boris' left-leaning policy positions (eg. his opposition to the £400 a week HB limit) but I absolutely despise Ken Livingstone.

I knew this would be you, LFN

Why do people always claim that the Tories didn't win?

The only reason why they didn't get a majority is because Labour had rigged the constituencies so that they were unfairly represented. If you look at the actual voting numbers (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_general_election,_2005)
(en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_general_election,_2010);

In the 2010 General Election the results were as follows;

Conservatives: 10,703,654
Labour: 8,606,517
Lib Dems: 6,836,248

In the 2005 General Election the results were as follows;

Conservatives: 8,784,915
Labour: 9,552,436
Lib Dems: 5,985,454

So, in the 2005 General Election Labour actually received less popular votes and won outright than the Tories did in 2010 when they didn't secure a majority (of constituencies).

So, in 2010 the Tories exceeded the popular vote of Labour in 2005 by over a million votes but because of the unequal size of the constituencies (politically in Labour's favour) they didn't get a majority. And this is why the Tories are trying to make the constituency sizes equal, so that this kind of unfairness doesn't happen again.

Longfingernails, may I recommend the FT's education coverage to cure you of your Gove love?

You could hardly accuse the paper of political bias, but their education correspondent's expose of the extra cash going to Academies when it was promised they would not have a financial advantage, as well as of Gove and his core team's attempts to by-pass the Freedom of Information by using personal email accounts is eye- opening.

that's really only like saying most people would prefer chickenpox to rabies