Priti Patel’s ultimate victory won’t be merely if Australia-style Rwanda flights ever take off. It will be if Labour sends them.
When they were mass-membership institutions, parties used to be able to integrate their populist extremes. Now, through a more diverse mass media, as well as the social media revolution, they are much less effective gatekeepers.
His victory in the Dutch elections was only possible because the mainstream parties had failed to control the country’s borders.
He is a talented populist and looks set to do well in next week’s Dutch election. The question is what he will do then.
Yet unlike insurgent parties in other countries, the Conservatives have time and again made themselves the party of a status quo that serves only the interests of older voters.