It's not so much about directly gaining votes as it is about rebranding his party as being in touch with today's society and a viable option for young voters - a bit like his attempts to make the Tories look good on environment issues. I recently saw some polls which seem to confirm an impression one easily gets by looking at British politics and society, that the Tories are still vilified by a considerable part of the population, and widely seen as looking only after their own kind of people. Going forward, those are things they need to get past one way or another.

That said, it's true that in the short term it'll hurt him more than it helps him, and even in the long run it's not really certain that it'll work - that will depend on whether he and his successors stick to that course.




Hehe.