Such difficulties explain some if not all of Cameron’s problems. His unforced error in presiding over a confused message in the 2010 general election proved to be crucial. The direction of the Conservative campaign was split, and the prospectus divided between the optimistic if inchoate ‘Big Society’ and the overdone pessimism of austerity on the economy. The election could have been won outright against a discredited prime minister and Labour Party, and a country disillusioned with thirteen years of Labour rule. Cameron was thus to a significant extent the author of some of his own problems during these five years. He was determined not to preside over the same divided campaign in the 2015 election. Vindication followed with the party achieving an overall majority, its first in twenty-three years. Cameron’s victory confounded the predictions of opinion pollsters and many commentators from both sides of the political spectrum. Critics said he only won because of last-minute fears of an SNP–Labour alliance, but research suggests economic arguments and Cameron’s qualities over Miliband were decisive. Victory shattered Miliband’s Labour Party as well as Nick Clegg’s Liberal Democrats. Both parties lost their leaders after the general election and immediately descended into disarray. The Conservatives, despite their slender majority, gained a political hegemony and confidence in the months that followed which they had not known since before Black Wednesday in 1992. It was to be short-lived.
Cameron’s critics have often pointed to his deficiencies as a long-term, strategic thinker. This criticism should not be overplayed or judged devoid of context. If Cameron lacked principles, how do we explain his standing by Plan A on the economy, gay marriage and the decision to spend 0.7% of GNP on international development? He expended considerable political capital in remaining fixed on each of these policies. His years in power were characterised by an uneasy mix of dogged adherence to such policies while displaying marked flexibility on others. He stuck by what he deemed the most important factors: coalition survival and economic recovery. Circumstances openly militated against long-termism, and flexibility is a virtue as well as a vice; often for Cameron it was additionally a necessity.
The economic recovery of 2010–15 defined the character of the coalition and Cameron’s premiership. Economists will argue whether the deficit should have been cut more quickly, or slowly, and whether it was the global economy rather than government policy which was more responsible for the restoration of economic fortunes. Osborne’s failure to eliminate the structural deficit during the life of the parliament, a commitment abandoned after only two years, brought much criticism at the time, though government spending as a proportion of GDP fell from some 45% to 40%, a not insignificant reduction in such a short period. In only five years in power, Cameron and Osborne achieved a reduction in public spending as a proportion of GDP approximately equal to the reduction achieved by Thatcher during the whole of her eleven years in power. By 2014 Britain had the fastest growth rate in the G7, with a strong record on job creation, and falling unemployment (2.2 million more were in work than in 2010), helped by low inflation and low interest rates.
Cameron and Osborne stuck by Plan A, albeit with modification, in the face of severe pressure, particularly during 2011–13. Public spending cuts were painfully felt, particularly by the young, who saw their benefits decline while pensioners were protected. Recovery was hampered by the continuing eurozone crisis and slowdown in global economic growth, but was helped by the fall in oil prices. Productivity remained sluggish by international standards, and real wages struggled to recover to pre-recession levels. The rise in living standards was skewed towards the south-east, which only began to be addressed by Osborne in his Northern Powerhouse strategy from mid-2014. Like Thatcher, Cameron invested great energy for a prime minister in his role as ‘chief salesman’ for the UK abroad, galvanising British companies to export, though export growth remained disappointing. He and Osborne worked hard to inject a more entrepreneurial spirit into British industry, symbolised by Tech-City in East London.
Osborne’s contribution to this government and Cameron’s premiership was seminal. Like Cameron, he grew in stature over the years, recovering strongly from his personal errors of judgement early on, notably the failure to win the 2010 general election outright, and the ‘omnishambles’ Budget of 2012. He was responsible for much of the strategic and tactical thinking of the government, though Cameron overruled Osborne when he thought he was being too tactical or his judgement was wrong. The most instinctive political operator in Cameron’s team, Osborne also possessed the quickest and subtlest mind. Cameron was always the more senior, as when he prevented Osborne from reducing the top rate of income tax to 40% in the 2012 Budget, deterring him from laying into the Lib Dems and gaining tactical advantage but at the expense of long-term strategy. He gave him cover and succour when deeply wounded for much of 2012. They spoke to each other almost every morning and evening over the five years, enjoying the most successful and harmonious senior political relationship of the last one hundred years. The secret of the success was the way they complemented each other: to an uncanny degree they thought as one. The chancellor/PM relationship, when it goes wrong, does so for two reasons: significant differences over policy, and ambition by the junior to replace the senior. In this case neither applied. Osborne knew when to bite his tongue and defer to Cameron, and, uniquely in modern British politics, neither the PM’s nor the chancellor’s teams ever briefed against the other. There were differences of emphasis, certainly: Osborne would have preferred to have been more aggressively liberal on social issues, more of a neocon on foreign policy, tougher on colleagues and backbenchers, and more of a tax and economic reformer, though it was the economic situation rather than Cameron that was the principal restraint. Cameron, the older figure by five years, was always more of a shire Tory, while Osborne was more of an urban liberal.
School reform took prominence among domestic achievements, the work of one minister above all: Michael Gove. He ferociously drove through a series of controversial reforms to make exams more rigorous, to improve the quality of teaching and to give schools more autonomy, establishing an altogether new breed of ‘free schools’, while greatly accelerating Labour’s programme of academies. When Gove was moved in July 2014, his successor Nicky Morgan was given clear instructions to continue his crusade, albeit with a more conciliatory hue. The success of the education reform agenda is far from established, however, with many academies struggling to meet expectations set for them, while the mark on social mobility will not be seen for many years.
Welfare was another domestic achievement, with Iain Duncan Smith introducing significant if contentious reforms to the benefits system to ensure that welfare was targeted at the most deserving, and those out of work were encouraged back into employment. He stuck doggedly to his flagship policy, Universal Credit, designed to unify and simplify previous systems, and against the odds, remained in office throughout the parliament and into the next before his sudden resignation in March 2016. As with education, it is too early to tell whether the ambitious welfare changes will prove an enduring success. Health policy was more uneven still, with two very different phases: a difficult two years when Andrew Lansley tried to introduce some important if flawed reforms to the NHS, and a second when Jeremy Hunt drove through amended reforms and pacified the NHS so successfully that it was not the predominant issue at the 2015 election, despite Labour making it their priority. Health reforms remained highly controversial after 2015, the subject of avid continuing debate.
At the Home Office, the most fraught department of state, Theresa May ran a tighter ship than many of her predecessors, battled to control non-EU immigration, and oversaw a reduction in crime despite severe cuts in the Home Office budget. Domestic successes came in several other areas, including public sector reform, but not in others, with plans for elected mayors in major British cities being largely