Plaid Cymru

The sad irony for Plaid Cymru is that they got exactly the campaign they wanted. They wanted this to be about leadership — and to make it a Presidential run off between Adam Price and Mark Drakeford, leaving the all-too quiet Paul Davies (the Conservative leader they thought would be in the mix) in the shadows. But, whilst Adam inched forwards in terms of recognition, the new First Minister surfed past him on a tidal wave of pandemic-powered popularity. Ask most Yes Cymru members who they’d like to be President of an independent Wales, and I reckon they’d choose Mark Drakeford. Added to this, the much noisier Andrew RT Davies jumped back into the mix as Tory leader, and did all the opposing when it came to the handling of the pandemic. Could Plaid have done anything to switch tactics as it became clear this wasn’t working? Yes, for sure, but it probably wouldn’t have been enough to save the Rhondda.

Things are not going to change for Plaid until they accept an unpalatable truth about the last twenty years. Welsh Labour don’t keep getting lucky — they keep making the right choices. Plaid Cymru don’t keep having bad luck — they keep making the wrong choices and talking about the wrong things. They simply don’t reflect back to the nation a version of Wales that most Welsh people recognise. Ambition and aspiration are great qualities, but they need to be anchored in the daily reality of Welsh life. A first bold step to show they get it would be to adopt Angus Robertson’s recommendation to rename themselves the New Wales Party. The post-election statements so far have not been promising.

Welsh Conservatives

It wasn’t a bad set of results for the Tories, but it wasn’t great either. Their decent share of the vote underlines once again that Wales is not the anti-Conservative monolith it is often considered — and that should be reflected more in the way we all talk about politics in this country. But, the fact that they stopped talking up Cardiff North and Vale of Glamorgan with some days to go showed they were going to struggle to build on the 2019 UK General Election result.

I think they will long lament losing gifted politicians (and the supporters they attracted) like Suzy Davies, Angela Burns and David Melding in the race to shore up the Abolish/UKIP vote. In the final analysis it seems that vote did not rush to them in numbers enough to make a transformative difference, or make that sacrifice worthwhile. They now face five long years where they (and we) will feel the absence of that skill, experience and intellect in the Senedd. That said the addition of Peter Fox, the long-time Monmouth leader, is a boon for them. He’s a pragmatic politician interested in getting things done. The new younger intake will give some freshness to the group — and the election of Natasha Asghar as the first woman of colour in the Senedd is an historic moment worthy of celebration across the country.

Welsh Liberal Democrats

I don’t know who would have been smiling more at the election of Jane Dodds — the Welsh Liberal Democrats, or those forming the next Welsh Labour Government. The importance of that single Lib Dem in how the next five years plays out cannot be overstated. Not because anyone in Welsh Labour will be taking Jane Dodds’ support for budgets and legislation for granted — far from it. I can tell you we never did that with Kirsty Williams and she was part of the Government! But, what it gives the biggest party in future negotiations is choice and leverage. Plaid Cymru are not the only game in town and that’s important.

This will all be second order stuff at the moment for the Welsh Liberal Democrat leader. Her priority in setting up her office and setting out her stall, will be to utilise this foothold to bring her party back from the brink. This result was one bright spot in an otherwise torrid election which saw previous strongholds swamped by the Tories. The Liberals really need to consider if they’ve got the reach and resource to be a truly national party for the foreseeable future — a policy platform and organisational rethink that digs back into the cities, ward by ward, might be their best bet.

As someone who worked in Welsh Labour politics for most of my adult life, and has been a Liverpool supporter for a lot longer than that, this year has been mightily instructive. Winning is one thing. Staying on top is a lot a harder. That’s even more true in politics than in football. Keeping that winning streak going for an entire generation, as Welsh Labour will have done by the next election in 2026, is an astonishing electoral achievement.

I’ve said for the last two successive devolved elections that was Labour’s best ever result, but today’s tops them all. To match that 30 seat high water mark in the current context deserves all the plaudits the party is getting today — from the Welsh commentariat at least, the vast majority of London’s political observers are still opining over Hartlepool.

So, who deserves the plaudits? We should start with those who don’t often get much publicity — mainly because they don’t seek it. And that’s Welsh Labour’s incredibly well drilled political staff, headed up by their General Secretary, Louise Magee. I know from painful experience what it is like getting the sign-off, attention and agreement you need from senior politicians who are often too busy running the country to remember about mailout deadlines and campaign meetings. Managing that process during a pandemic would have required the patience of Job, the knowhow of Machiavelli and the willpower of Alun Wyn Jones.

Do we need to talk about the role of lady luck in Labour’s wins? I would be the first to admit (a few years after the result, at least) that in 2016 we relied on some luck to bring home all the marginals we did. We would have been happy with 26 seats at that point. This time the fact that the election coincided with the vaccine bounce, not lockdown gloom, certainly helped. But, you can’t seriously say that any politician, or political party, is lucky to have been holding the fort when along comes the worst public health crisis in any of our lifetimes. Rather you could argue that Wales has been lucky to have the politicians in charge that we did when the pandemic hit. The vaccine bounce didn’t happen by accident. You don’t have to believe me. Look at the 10,000 majorities racked up by the First Minister in Cardiff West and the Health Minister in Cardiff South & Penarth and draw your own conclusions. It is a vote of confidence on a massive scale. So look to leadership, not luck, to find your most important answers about this victory.

A word too for Julie James. The political campaign manager is not a glamorous job, but it is hugely important. You’re the phone call when things go wrong. You’re the peacekeeper, motivator and mollifier. Julie is, I think, one of Welsh Labour’s most underrated assets — not for much longer.

Does that mean it was a perfect campaign? No, of course not. There were stumbles at the start. The list of pledges looked like the result of a an argument that nobody won. And no-one will be more gutted at losing the Vale of Clwyd than Ann Jones, who had held off the Tories since 1999. But, such was the strength of performance right across Wales these were no more than stumbles on the road to Welsh Labour’s most remarkable victory.

It was clear when Welsh Labour switched up its campaign slogan to “if you value it, vote for it” things were going better than expected. A positive get-out-the-vote strapline meant that canvass returns were overwhelmingly positive, and minds didn’t need to be changed, it was now a matter of turning support into votes. Few pundits picked up on the significance of that switch-up, and for the political parties who did — by then it was already too late.

I prefer to talk about hope, because generally it is grounded in something. Ask someone to quote FDR’s most famous line from his inaugural address in 1933, and they’ll rightly say “that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself”. But, he also said this:

“More important, a host of unemployed citizens face the grim problem of existence, and an equally great number toil with little return. Only a foolish optimist can deny the dark realities of the moment.”

No blind optimism, or happy talk from the new President. His approach was grounded in a firm understanding of the difficult present — that is what made his plan for a more prosperous future the more compelling. Hope was his fuel, not his plan. A similar thread could be seen in the inauguration speech of Barack Obama in 2009 in the midst of the financial crash. He said: “Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time”.

With the rapid rollout of vaccines across the U.K. people have every right to be feeling more positive, but governments and frontline services must recognise this as a moment of communications risk too. Hope isn’t a strategy all of its own, and there are plenty of missteps which still require a proper examination and a thorough reckoning. There is a fragility to our optimism too. Not just because of the previous false starts, but because as businesses and individuals we’ve all shelved certain things ‘whilst we get through’. Scratch the surface and many people are still feeling combinations of loss, anger and uncertainty. Many in the hospitality industry will give it a fresh go this year, but many expect to struggle. We have all battened down the hatches for many months now, and when we fling open the windows, the sunlight could be harsh as well as bright. Organisations need to tiptoe their way to a change in tone, and there needs to be a clear plan for the future. We’ve seen where optimism bias takes us, and we want no more of that. We’ve seen the slogan — building back better — now we want to see the bricks and mortar.

Hope is not the machinery of change, but it is the fuel. It is the impetus that drives us forwards and it’s an essential element of all crisis communications. No matter how bleak things can get, Emily Dickinson was right: hope is the thing with feathers, and it never stops – at all.

“Hope” is the thing with feathers

That perches in the soul -

And sings the tune without the words -

And never stops – at all -

And sweetest – in the Gale – is heard -

And sore must be the storm -

That could abash the little Bird

That kept so many warm -

I’ve heard it in the chillest land -

And on the strangest Sea -

Yet – never – in Extremity,

It asked a crumb – of me.

Emily Dickinson

It is important that you see this picture. The police are arresting this woman because they don’t think she should be there. It is still true that if you are ever in really big trouble the police are there to help you. But sometimes they get things really badly wrong too. This is one of those times. And hopefully a lot of things will change because of it. Like what happened to Rosa Parks, Rosa – where your name came from – sometimes bad things can lead to changes.

The woman in the picture is called Patsy Stevenson. She was there with all those other people because they were very sad and very angry about a terrible crime. A man kidnapped and killed a woman when she was on her way home a few days ago. Since then women and girls have shared lots and lots of stories about bad things that boys and men have said and done to them. You know from your books and things we’ve talked about that these things have happened for as long as anyone can remember. Because these bad things nearly always go unpunished, they keep happening.

You need to know you’re safe with your family, but it’s also important to know that bad things can happen, and feeling sad and angry about that is exactly right. Always be certain that this is not right. It shouldn’t be normal for girls and women to be attacked. Or bad things said to them. It shouldn’t be normal for the police to be so terrible at helping. Always be sure to be angry. I am here to be angry with you and help always. It is never a woman’s fault if they are attacked. None of these things are your fault. It’s the most awful and unfair thing in the world that you have to be worried about this. You will often become so very tired trying to make sense of it all and hearing that things will be better and it doesn’t get better.

There are lots of things we can do to try and help. We can support charities that save women from bad situations. We can write stories and letters. Talk to other people. It is important the police are told that they did wrong, and that they must change a lot of things they do now. We shouldn’t let people off who have the power to change all this. There’s loads of things they can do, but they don’t do it. We need to make sure they do their jobs better.

We also need to think about who we are and what we do. The hardest part in changing how all this works is being strong and confident enough to call out anyone close to you who is doing something wrong. That’s a really, really hard thing to do. But we need to do it. Otherwise change never comes, not really. You know I love big speeches and think they’re important. But, really that’s the easy bit. Very often people know other people who are doing wrong but do nothing about it, because it’s a really scary thing to do. It’s really scary, but really important. Always ask questions if you are never sure about something.

As your dad there’s loads of things I need to be better at helping with. That all men and boys need to do better. You know I love running, well because of all the stories that women have shared this week, I’m now trying to be extra careful to run a big distance away from girls and women on their own in case I scare them. There are lots of little things like that which can make a big difference if we all do them, they will add up.

I’m sorry things aren’t better. I’m sorry it’s going to take so much of your lifetimes to make things better. Keep asking questions. Keep being cross. I’m here to help in any way I can.

Love, Dad.

At this year’s (virtual) Christmas party for the European Speechwriter’s Network, a few of us were asked about writing for laughs on zoom. Is it advisable? Is it even possible, especially this year of all years. Writing a talk to give to professional speechwriters is *always* a tough gig, but defending the right to be funny to a wall of silent faces — now that is tough. Here’s my poem/talk for the evening, making my case.

Can you really be funny on Teams or on Zoom?

Can we transmit laughter and light into your room?

And can you be funny at all in this cursed year of our Lord, 2020?

A year filled with bad tidings, death and misery aplenty?

Well, yes you can — speechwriters please listen to me.

It isn’t an option to be funny. It is our duty.

Can you even remember January, or February of this year?

When war with Iran seemed likely and near.

What were people talking about before the outbreak in China?

Gwyneth Paltrow selling candles that smelled of her vagina,

In Australia they had to deal with their own bushfire

Wherever you looked things looked bleak, scary and dire.

The tabloids went after Harry Windsor and Megan Markle,

The golden couple lost all of their sparkle,

At least among the old, white and patriarchal.

But all the while we kept a smile and told a joke

Even when the news of the pandemic broke.

Boris would fix it, he’s a bloody good bloke,

Happy-go-lucky and definitely not woke.

He invoked the blitz spirit but got nowhere near it,

He shook hands with the virus, yet told us to fear it,

He filled a racecourse with punters and plague

And waffled about the war, baffling and vague.

It started badly and got worse from there,

Not even a small comb passed through his hair.

We got locked down in attics, bedrooms and cupboards

Stared at screens, spoke on mute, drank wine and blubbered.

For the dreary presentations — a thumbs up or a mechanical wave

This is where speechwriters must come in, to be funny and brave

To lighten the mood whilst the country gets screwed.

To find truth in humour, humanity and hope,

Write like lions and tigers, not donkeys or dopes.

Recall Shakespeare teaching his leaders how to best rule,

The lessons that count come from Falstaff and Fool,

Use whimsy and fancy to turn dark places sunny

Roll out the japes, jokes, puns — let’s make it funny.

When the President suggests we fill our veins full of bleach

You must open your jokebook and lighten the speech.

Because people need to smile and not be forlorn

In 2020 — yes 2020 — people got married and babies were born

Weinstein went down, Parasite won best movie,

Liverpool won the league — that mattered to me!

Our best writers, Dylan, Dolly and Swift gave us new songs

Whilst statues of slave traders were toppled and gone.

When he knew he was losing “Stop the Count!” Trump tweeted out

Which is a typo away from what we all wanted to shout.

Now we can look forward to Biden and Harris

Who believe in science and will sign up to Paris.

If you look hard enough there is momentum and light

There’s a vaccine now, and an end is in sight.

Give your speakers a chance to break through the gloom

Ask them to practise — yes, even though its on zoom.

Give them your quickest and wittiest while the world really needs it

And watch them mess it all up because the buggers won’t read it.

“Joe knows the anguish of sitting at a table with an empty chair.” So said Michelle Obama in her closer to the Democrats’ first night of their virtual convention.

This line, about the tragedies experienced by Joe Biden in his life, was one of many beautifully crafted images in a typically brilliant speech. The empathy she showed in her address, and recognised in this line about Biden was in savage contrast to her take-down of Donald Trump.

It was never going to be an easy task to pull off the drama and theatre of convention speeches without a live audience. The sound of no hands clapping is the most depressing culmination to any speech given outside a courtoom. There are things for others to learn from the oddity of this occasion.

The backdrop chosen for Bernie Sanders (a wall of chopped wood) put me in mind of Twin Peaks, although Twitter assures me it is very on-brand for Vermont. Either way, some of the lines from a normally exciting speaker felt pretty wooden too.

Nero fiddled while Rome burned. Trump golfed.

Eeesh. That’s more deadwood than a twisted fire starter, but his speech urging his supporters to get behind Biden did the job required.

Meanwhile, a Republican speaker for Biden, John Kasich, claimed that America was at a crossroads. He filmed his remarks at… you guessed it. A crossroads. If these are the rules now, I look forward to Trump’s next address about Space Force. Poor old Kasich became an instant meme, but I do have some sympathy with him. No live audience — your presence on screen is everything, so what do you do with it?

Governor Cuomo’s answer, in his characterisctcally pugnacious five minute slot, was to reprise the feel of his famous daily press conferences, complete with slides. That works for him, that’s who he is to the nation now. He was right to embrace it.

In the Obamas, the Democrats are blessed with two of the great speakers of our time. And so the former First Lady went with a minimal backdrop, a blurred Biden poster visible over one shoulder. The only visual trickery, an occasional use of a second camera angle. And so the words were left to carry the day. And they did so, but only just.

Her remarks were brilliantly crafted, and delivered perfectly — bending her tone slightly to a more informal style. Even so, and despite delivering a punishing (and out-of-character) ad hominem attack, it was pushing it a little at 18 minutes to hold the attention completely. Others will stumble and fall if they try and repeat this style. They need to innovate. Or keep it short. Ideally, do both.

As political speeches go, those delivered at conventions, and party conferences here in the UK, are different beasts. They are longer and cover much more varied ground than you’d ever recommend for almost any other kind of talk. And pretty much the only thing that makes even the best of them survivable are the laughs, the claps and cheers. Sometimes the tension too, if the speaker is challenging the audience a little.

It will be interesting to see how the rest of the Convention unfolds. Whether we start to see more film interspersing the speeches. Will anyone experiment a little more. Speeches about the war on coronavirus from an actual war zone? Interesting too, will be what the parties on this side of the pond can learn about capturing the room via zoom. Early lessons from this convention are: if you’re going to rely just on words, take the tone down from bullhorn, to living-room-friendly — and those words will really have to fly. For the mortal, non-Obamas, keep it short. And use the TV screen as God intended — more moving pictures, please.

Although it was hard being away from my daughters in Cardiff at such a weird time for them, I knew I was in the right place. My girls are young, and they will bounce back into a bright new future, no matter how uncertain it looks right now. The only thing I could do was hold on to the present as hard as my dad was trying to. To watch, and cherish and wait. Look for fragments in each day. Moments of lucidity and connection during long quiet days. Memories that we could cling on to, when the looming aching absence became a reality.

100 days ago I laced up my trainers and set off up the steep lung bursting hill to the lighthouse at South Stack, and then up Holyhead Mountain. It was a bright, brash spring afternoon. Gorse flowers were illuminated by the sun, soft yellow firework bursts against a spiky military green backdrop. I swore frequently and jovially as I started my semi-controlled run and fall down the other side of the mountain (I’m not much of a fell runner) and raced the Irish Ferry into the port. Gasping back up the last hill to the house, I paused to look for my dad’s favourite trick of light, where faraway chimneys silhoutte against the sea like giant canoeists paddling for the shore.

From then until now, the eve of lockdown, I’ve run every day. The day my dad died. And the day of his funeral. The days I wrote speeches and delivered training courses. The days I drank too much and the days I tried much harder to be there for everyone around me. I ran and I ran. Into town. Up the mountain. Along the coast path. Through the fields. I found out that actually I didn’t need a break and my legs and lungs can get used to plenty more punishment, if I was in the mood to dish it out. And I found that my mind needed it, craved it. I don’t think I was running away from anything, I think I was running to stand still. To clear my mind enough to stay in the present. To remind me who my dad was, and what the illness was, and that they were not the same.

As I padded across the soft mud coastal path on my favourite route, I started to realise that the things in life that really made me happy were few, and simple. Sea air, sunshine, open countryside, family and friends. Enough good food to eat, hot showers and clean clothes. Ok, and a couple of beers. The rest just seemed to retreat into fluff and nonsense. I know that lots of people have had their mindsets challenged by lockdown, and by the passing of a loved one. And I know too that much of this might feel like forgotten new years resolutions in a few months time. We’ll see. I will say that not a run went by when I didn’t thank my lucky stars that I was locked down surrounded by wild, open and deserted coastline. It has been tougher for most. It allowed me to escape the smaller hard realities, and connected me to nature. And to my dad. My first memories of us together involve early morning moonlit walks along the seafront with our dog, Prince. Before school. Before work. When the milkman had not long finished his rounds, bottles still on doorsteps. Skipping stones and sinking German submarines (in the shape of errant logs and plastic bottles).

The sea has always been there, whether I’m walking or running, giving a welcome and understanding edge to the world. A blessed full stop at the end of a difficult sentence. I hugged it tighter with each run.

And now back in Cardiff. Six weeks since the funeral. I’m still running to stand still and stay present. The city parks, normally my favourite part of the city, are a poor substitute for the north Wales coast. But, they provide some sort of peace, if you can avoid the ever widening teenage huddles.

Today I’ll lace up my trainers and run for the 100th day in a row and my legs don’t feel tired at all.

Marcus Rashford would have made an unlikely case study the last time I ran the Civil Service College’s Executive Presence training course. However, his campaign to persuade England to maintain free school meal vouchers over the summer period was definitely worth discussing. How did this young, quietly spoken footballer manage to rally so many people to his cause?

There were three key elements to his success —

1. there was one clearly articulated goal — maintain the vouchers;
2. he adopted a studiously reasonable tone — it was never framed as a partisan attack on the government;
3. he used his own personal story of hardship in an open and honest way that hammered home both his message, and his authenticity.

Certainly the exisiting social following Rashford enjoyed helped the campaign fly from the off, but without the story, the message and getting the right tone it could have dropped quickly down the agenda, or even badly backfired.

Such was the success of the Premiership star’s campaign, that none of the course delegates so much as blinked when he followed onto the screen after Angela Merkel (the explainer), Jacinda Ardern (the empathiser) and Barack Obama (the comforter in chief). Now add Marcus Rashford (the storyteller).

And that is the point I try to reinforce during this course — there is no one way to lead. No one way to be effective. You have to find a strategy that works for you and builds on the strengths you already have. The course is aimed at people who want to take the next step up the ladder. Often people who are experts in their field — used to having all the answers to all the questions in their world. When given broader responsibilities and even having to admit… “I don’t know” for the first time in their working lives. To go back to football (can you tell I’ve missed it?) this difficult shift from being brilliant at one thing, to then being good at lots of things, explains why so many of the best players fail, or don’t even try, as managers. Broadening your view across a whole organisation is tough, and it requires building new skills. But, it doesn’t mean you need to surrender who you are, or where you come from.

Given the events of recent weeks, and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, I’ve never been more aware that the notion of executive presence, loosely defined, can be misused and abused in the corporate world, and in public service alike. Take this example from a recent Economist study into business and race in America:

…white managers are often hesitant to give black employees candid and frequent feedback. This backfires when the workers who think they are doing well suddenly get sacked. Challenged about this, the managers typically use euphemisms like “she just wasn’t exuding enough executive presence.”

If we too closely define leadership styles, and Executive Presence, with what the world already looks like, we’re heading for trouble. This simply allows organisations not to face down existing bias in terms of race or gender — and it also deprives those same organisations of badly need plurality in leadership teams.

Far from asking people to surrender to traditional leadership norms, the course I run works with people to develop their confidence in what they bring to the table. As for Marcus Rashford, that’s going to account for over 1 million free meals for deprived children this summer. Nice work.

Keir Starmer is good news for the Labour Party. And right now, more than ever, that means he’s good news for the country as well. It is no time for democracy to take a holiday. The slow, sclerotic decision-making of the UK Government in recent days has been matched only by the media’s inability to effectively scrutinise the Prime Minister and his team. A responsible, grown-up opposition is long overdue to add ballast to a political system flailing in response to the coronavirus crisis. A good opposition is still unlikely to make the weather in the immediate future, but they can at least point out when it’s raining.

Starmer’s leadership is also set to have a big impact on our politics in Wales. Here’s a leader who gets Wales, who gets devolution. And here’s a leader who needs no convincing about the need to create a more sustainable and equitable relationship between the four nations. During the early stages of the Brexit negotiations, Starmer and his team listened to Welsh Government concerns about Labour’s approach could impact on Wales and worked constructively on solutions that made sense in a devolved context. Not just that, but the opinions of Welsh Ministers about the overall UK approach were also taken seriously and acted upon. The joint working was effective and showed a level of mutual respect not always apparent in these bilateral discussions.

When working and campaigning in Wales, it was clear that Starmer did not require the back-to-basics style briefing about the country and devolved politics. He’s comfortable here. The overwhelming backing of Welsh MPs and constituency parties didn’t just reflect a strong ground campaign, it showed support for a unifying message that worked in a Welsh context. Given her ongoing righteous war with online betting companies, Carolyn Harris won’t necessarily thank me for the following comparison. And yet it was something of a gamble for the Deputy Leader of the party in Wales to take such a prominent role in running the Starmer campaign. But, it worked brilliantly. She is just one of a handful of Welsh MPs who can expect to have a big role to play on the opposition frontbench.

The Welsh First Minister, Mark Drakeford, was an early supporter of Jeremy Corbyn and I’m sure on one level he will be deeply disappointed by the failures of the Corbyn project. You could hear the genuine hurt in the First Minister’s voice in the hours after the 2019 General Election defeat. But, in Keir Starmer he will find a leader who matches him in intellect, rigour and an ability to filter passionately held values into pragmatic solutions. They have already worked together closely and effectively on Brexit, and the existing relationships between their teams will also make communication so much easier.

That strong Welsh connection brings big Welsh issues closer to the surface as the new opposition develops its identity. Rail electrification, tidal lagoons, the future of Wylfa — these are issues that all need strong advocates at the top table. And surely there will be space in the future to rethink the entire policy approach for the Labour Party. It is difficult to see how the much-debated 2019 manifesto can be anything other than a footnote in political history. That has nothing to do with its merits or otherwise. The current crisis, and the massive state response to it, has simply blown away old assumptions. Everyone must surely start with a blank sheet of paper when the dust settles.

Sadly the coronavirus crisis has many more months to run before such discussions can start in earnest. The immediate task for the new opposition is find the right balance between being constructive and critical at the right times — and matching forensic questioning with giving strong voice to public sentiment. Keir Starmer can definitely rise to that challenge. His election is a good thing for our politics, and a good thing for Wales.

Voice cracking with emotion outside 10 Downing Street, Theresa May announced her resignation date as Prime Minister almost five years to the day that she gave one of the most electrifying speeches in recent British political history. And yet that 2014 address to the Police Federation couldn’t have seemed further away as the nation watched, conflicted and divided, a beaten Mrs May preparing to leave the stage. What started with a bang, ended with a whimper.

I cannot think of a British Prime Minister in my lifetime for whom the success and failures of their key-note speeches has more dramatically shaped their leadership.Before securing the top job, Mrs May’s rise to prominence came on the back of not one, but two incredibly brave speeches in which she took on the audiences sat in-front of her. The Police Federation speech, made as Home Secretary, is one I often refer to in training sessions as an example of how to use a speech to successfully take a risk.

“It is not enough to mouth platitudes about a few bad apples. The problem might lie with a minority of officers, but it is still a significant problem, and a problem that needs to be addressed.” Police Federation Conference, 2014

She used high office to call out unacceptable behaviour – corruption, racism and prejudice inside the police force that for too long had been excused as the fault of a “few bad apples”. She arrived to polite applause, left to stony silence, but the point had been hammered home.

Over a decade earlier, she shocked another audience by telling the Conservative Conference in Bournemouth that their “nasty party” image had to change – and called for an overhaul in the party’s approach to politics. It was, or should have been, as iconic for the Tories as Neil Kinnock’s anti-militant speech was in 1985. The leopard print shoes, which showed she wasn’t afraid of a bit of stagecraft, and that “nasty party” line may have been the things that people remember – but go back and read the rest of the speech. It is brave, forthright, and thrilling – and looking at politics today, incredibly prescient.

The last great speech she made came on the day she took office as Prime Minister. If you look at that text, there are sections that would resonate with voters from every political party. That is the hallmark of a party leader becoming a national leader – they must embody the hopes and dreams of an entire country, not a single party, still less just a sect of that party. May used the traditional Tory theme of unionism to springboard into something new – a desire for a united country in which inequality and injustice could be vanquished, and where people “just about managing” could get a fairer shake of the dice.

“…we believe in a union not just between the nations of the United Kingdom but between all of our citizens, every one of us, whoever we are and wherever we’re from.” First speech as Prime Minister, 10 Downing Street, 2016

Technically it was brilliant too. It had an easy rhythm, lovely pace, a simple theme, quotable soundbites. Here was a speaker with a mission, in absolute control.

You never want your first day in a job to be the high watermark of a political career, but it really was all downhill after this moment. You can argue, with some justification, that with such a polarised country the task ahead was almost impossible – but with every big decision, and every speech, the Prime Minister made her own task even more difficult.

The most prominent of these interventions was the Lancaster House speech in January 2017, where we first heard “no deal is better than a bad deal”. There were enormous problems with this speech, which set out in painstaking detail the government’s negotiating objectives for exiting the EU.

“So today I want to outline our objectives for the negotiation ahead. Twelve objectives that amount to one big goal: a new, positive and constructive partnership between Britain and the European Union.” Lancaster House speech, January 2017

Just on a basic technical level, a speech is an awful way to transmit this level of detailed information. Much better to win hearts and minds with oratory, and follow up with a plan in written form. But, secondly and more importantly, the Prime Minister set out a number of red lines too early in the process and boxed herself into a corner from which ultimately the only escape was resignation.

At least Theresa May still looked and sounded like a Prime Minister at this point, but she never really recovered from the humbling 2017 General Election a few months later. The period after that is pockmarked by a number of disastrous set-piece speeches – from the cringe-worthy “dancing queen” to the moment she lost her voice, a Conference stage fell apart, and she was handed a p45 live on stage.

Her final two big speeches showed just how diminished she had become, as a speaker and as a Prime Minister. On March 20, after a string of defeats in the Commons, Theresa May addressed the nation from Downing Street. This was a short, unpleasant – you might even say nasty speech in which she legitimised the notion of Parliamentarians as traitors, betraying the people who elected them. It was a shoddy speech in terms of style, tone and morals. All the bravery had gone and the promised search for unity with which she entered number 10 had completely vanished.

Finally, we had the odd, awful tearful farewell. Let’s leave aside the debate on whether the tears were moving or just weak, and think about some other oddities that exemplify how the Prime Minister had become tone deaf as a public speaker. First there was the list of supposed achievements, that so many people would have associated with failures – the Grenfell public inquiry being the most prominent.

Secondly, she recalled some words of advice she received from the humanitarian hero, Sir Nicholas Winton: “Life depends on compromise.” And yet it was May’s unbending approach that became a hallmark of her leadership.

Finally came the assertion that she was leaving office with “no ill will”. This is a ridiculous thing to say in a resignation speech – not only does it betray the fact that there is indeed an ocean of ill will bubbling up and being supressed, it also shows a staggering lack of humility about the incredible opportunity you are given as Prime Minister.

They say all political careers end in failure, but some are squandered.

In Theresa May, the Conservatives, and the country had a leader and speaker who was capable of so much more than she eventually delivered.

The key quotes from May’s big speeches

“There’s a lot we need to do in this party of ours. Our base is too narrow and so, occasionally, are our sympathies. You know what some people call us – the nasty party.” Conservative Party Conference, Bournemouth, 2002

“It is not enough to mouth platitudes about a few bad apples. The problem might lie with a minority of officers, but it is still a significant problem, and a problem that needs to be addressed.” Police Federation Conference, 2014

“…we believe in a union not just between the nations of the United Kingdom but between all of our citizens, every one of us, whoever we are and wherever we’re from.” First speech as Prime Minister, 10 Downing Street, 2016

“So today I want to outline our objectives for the negotiation ahead. Twelve objectives that amount to one big goal: a new, positive and constructive partnership between Britain and the European Union.” Lancaster House speech, January 2017

“So far, Parliament has done everything possible to avoid making a choice. Motion after motion and amendment after amendment have been tabled without Parliament ever deciding what it wants.” Downing Street, 20th March 2019

“I will shortly leave the job that it has been the honour of my life to hold – the second female Prime Minister but certainly not the last. I do so with no ill-will…” Resignation speech, Downing Street, 24 May 2019