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Which party will occupy the centre ground of British politics by the time of the next election, presumably in 2024? The answer is not obvious, especially for those who have bought the line

that Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn are both extremists of Right and Left respectively, while seeing the centre as a zone populated by pro-European, metropolitan social democrats like

themselves. The latter is more or less the position of four out of five candidates for the Labour leadership: Lisa Nandy, Jess Phillips, Emily Thornberry and Sir Keir Starmer. If _only_ one

of _them_, rather than that awful old man, had been leading the party, Labour might even have won.   The problem is that too few voters agree. That is why Boris Johnson won the biggest Tory

majority for 32 years. Most people think of themselves as moderate, centre-Left or centre-Right, and they judge the party platforms accordingly. Labour in 2019 wasn’t just a little too far

Left for most of the electorate — it was right off the scale. Corbyn and Brexit were totemic because most people blamed them for their own economic plight. Fear of a hard Left government

that would destroy the economy was a big factor in the subdued climate of the past few years and especially the second half of last year. Brexit was the other cause of uncertainty — which

was why the Conservative promise to “get it done” appealed to many voters. Labour’s shift towards a second referendum was the last thing they wanted to hear. Just because many people cited

Corbyn and Brexit, however, does not mean that they were happy with Labour in other respects. On the contrary: on most issues, the party seemed to be having a conversation with itself rather

than the people to whom it was supposedly accountable. Its negativity about Britain, fuelled by a brand of identity politics that still seems alien to most, was matched by its failure to

put its own house in order. So anti-Semitism served as a catalyst for the deep unease that many felt about Labour, and the strong conviction that it had deliberately abandoned the centre

ground. There is no such thing as a moderate anti-Semite.  Not many of these home truths have had a hearing in the Labour contest so far, because the game is all about proving one’s

socialist and preferably working-class credentials. So even Yvette Cooper — a woman who has always been well to the Left of Tony Blair, but is neither a socialist nor working-class — did not

bother to stand. Indeed, the era of Blair and Brown is now seen as a great betrayal of socialism.  It is not as though most people are especially content: most are still going through tough

times. They just didn’t see far-Left ideology as relevant to their predicament and many felt threatened by it. Labour has still not grasped that anti-capitalist policies which could put

people’s savings, property and pensions at risk are anathema to voters, most of whom have been less well-cushioned than politicians and union officials over the last decade. It was striking

how many “traditional” Labour voters in the North and the Midlands, with only modest accumulations of wealth, but high aspirations for themselves and their families, were the ones who broke

the habit of a lifetime to vote Tory. Security, not solidarity, is their highest virtue. The politics of prosperity beats the politics of envy into a cloth cap. The Liberal Democrats need

not detain us long. They, even more than Labour, are going through one of their periods of introversion. Having been given a larger injection of talent in the form of refugees from both the

major parties than they ever wanted or deserved, they have squandered it. The seat involuntarily vacated by the unlamented Jo Swinson remains empty and will remain so for another six months.

The self-styled party of the centre has decamped to the outermost periphery of politics. So how will Boris Johnson, who finds himself unexpectedly occupying the entire centre ground,

consolidate his possession of it? This most inscrutable of individuals knows how to communicate with the people far better than others who wear their hearts on their sleeves. This least

virtuous of Tories has nonetheless been trusted by millions who despise the virtue-signalling of the Left. As he has been forgiven more than others, so he has earned the right to preach

forgiveness over Brexit and reconciliation with Europe. This is the balm that a bruised and embittered nation needs.  In concrete terms, we are already seeing the emergence of the most

ambitious rebalancing of the relationship between the regions and the capital since Joseph Chamberlain. The proposed move of the House of Lords to York, indeed, goes far beyond anything

conceived by “our Joe”, as Brummies called him. Is it a punishment for the almost unanimous refusal of peers to acknowledge the verdict of the 2016 referendum? Or an attempt to inject new

life into an almost literally moribund institution by bringing it into closer contact with the country it purports to protect from “democratic dictatorship”? The news that, in order to enjoy

Jeremy Corbyn’s patronage, John Bercow will have to trundle up North every week might just wipe the smile off the former Speaker’s face. Five years is a long time in politics, but in the

life of a great nation it is a mere interlude. Boris Johnson has ample time to redirect resources away from prestige projects, such as HS2, towards more practical, piecemeal improvements

that benefit the whole country. Above all, he is determined to govern in a pragmatic, non-ideological manner that reflects the empirical cast of mind of the British people. For all his

onomatopoeia and omniscience, the Boris style is triumphantly demotic.  Unlike the BBC, which behaves as though it knows how we ought to think, the PM tries to articulate the way most people

actually do think. Last week’s fuss about the actor Laurence Fox’s appearance on Question Time indicates how rarely such voices are heard on the BBC and why it is in such deep trouble.

Expect the new Director-General to drag the nation’s broadcasting service, kicking and screaming, a little closer to the people who pay for it. In just over six months, Boris and his merry

men (not to mention the women) have busied themselves extending the boundaries and definition of the centre. His tent is big enough to include it all — with enough bread and circuses inside

to keep everyone happy. By the next election, Boris Johnson won’t just be occupying the centre ground. He will have made himself thoroughly at home there.