Every time London Fashion Week ostentatiously saunters around (wearing an unnecessarily jaunty hat and a pair of Astroturf pantaloons), Number 10 decides to throw a party. These celebrations are organised for precisely the same reasons Downing Street throws parties for farmers, boffins or the Welsh; to show they care.
Before David Cameron became toxic, he held his fair share, inviting fashion designers, industry leaders, journalists and photogenic magazine hardbodies to gargle supermarket Picpoul and inhale mini pork pies. But even he misread the room, looking coy and embarrassed at having to represent an industry that (unbeknownst to him) actually contributes more to British GDP than the car industry.
Motor cars he got, trousers he never would. Things were worse when Theresa May was in post, as I seem to remember that the fashion fraternity was so embarrassed at having her as PM that they requested the event be postponed for six months.
Because, let’s face it, the Tories have always had a massive problem with culture. Sure, they like a bit of Glyndebourne and wouldn’t mind if Ed Sheeran popped up at their local black tie charity bash wearing a hastily assembled tenue but essentially they are culture blind. If they weren’t, they wouldn’t have appointed the likes of David Mellor, Oliver Dowden, Virginia Bottomley, the appalling Nadine Dorries (forever and indelibly rebranded as Mad Nad) or “mauling” Matt Hancock to steer the DCMS.
Ed Vaizey is always brandished as an example of a modern culturally-astute Conservative but while he has extremely good taste and a pretty good record collection (he’s a friend of mine and doesn’t frown when I start banging on about the Chemical Brothers), he’s hardly a representative Tory.
When I used to represent the fashion industry (I was a chair of the British Fashion Council), I threw my fair share of swanky parties. When Hancock was culture secretary I invited him to one, at the Berner’s Tavern in Fitzrovia. That day he had been made health secretary (look how that worked out), so his office said he could only stay for drinks. Fair enough, I thought, but as the night wore on, we were waiting for him to leave so that we could sit down and eat.
But the bugger wasn’t budging. And we soon realised why. He was desperate for a selfie with Rita Ora (“for my kids, actually”), and as soon as he got it he was out of the door as fast as a Liberal Democrat after losing a south London by-election.
Tories just don’t do culture. Which is why next year might be even more challenging for them than they think. If, as the runes suggest, Rishi Sunak and his MDF kitchen cabinet get pounded in the election by Karma Starmer Chameleon, they will be walking out of Downing Street with a much bigger and far more existential problem than the prospect of five years in the political wilderness. Because while they will be licking their wounds, lying in the sun, quietly confident that the British public will soon be yearning for some economic stability and a rebooted expansionist mindset (frankly, I’m there already), they’ll also know that most people couldn’t give a fig for analysts or financial gurus.
I like my bank manager, but I don’t love my bank manager.
Because we love pop stars. And theatre directors. And film directors. And architects. And furniture designers. And mavericks like the adorable Tracey Emin or the ridiculous Grayson Perry (who I personally can’t stand, but there we are). We buy books, devour podcasts, dress up for garden cocktails and think we might buy a jazzy Hoover (mint or tangerine?). Because we define ourselves by the things we like, the things we consume, and the passions that make us feel fulfilled.
I would proffer that most people these days no longer identify with a political party, not really. We might be a little bit right, a little bit left, a little bit it’s-your-turn-because-the-last-lot-have-been-around-too-much. But what we do identify with are the books, songs, films and unnecessary drunken dawns that have made us what we are today.
So, five years after the Conservatives have lost next year’s general election, we might very well be clamouring for some economic cohesion (I’m sure I will, in fact I know I will), but we won’t be bothered about being invited to any of their parties.
And I should know, because I’ve been to them.
