Centrist Democrats withdraw from New Conservative Coalition
The move comes after Victor Cutter’s appointment as co-leader of the party
Ragnvald Sigurdsson (he/him), Deputy politics writer
Tuesday, 27 March 2023
Ravneby — Not too long after party officials declared a “strategic reevaluation phase”, the Centrist Democratic Party announced on Monday that it formally withdrew from the New Conservative Coalition, a party bloc that included the Conservative Party, The New Right, and the Northern Party. In a joint statement, Centrist Democratic co-leaders Bradley Murphy and Victor Cutter cited “growing extremism” as their reason for breaking with the Coalition.
Positioned among the centre-right in Valkyrian politics, the Centrist Democratic Party was founded in 2016 during a bitter internal dispute between multiple factions in the United Conservative Party. The 2016 dispute led to the party splitting in three, giving way to a Conservative Party led by Giovanni Giletti, The New Right led by Nicole Chancellor, and a Centrist Democratic Party co-founded by centrist politicians that saw the Conservative Party as “irreversibly broken”, as Victor Cutter had stated when he joined the party in 2016.
Leading up to the 2019 general election, Conservative leader Stella Kaufman reached an agreement with Chancellor and her New Right to reform the old United Conservative Party as a bloc known as the New Conservative Coalition. Almost immediately, the agreement was called a “devil’s bargain” by the left and independent right, signalling Kaufman’s willingness to compromise with the far right.
It had been reported at the time that many Centrist Democratic officials were furious about the deal, with some party officials telling the news media that Cutter called the agreement the Conservatives’ “death knell to the fascists”. However, when the 2019 general election unfolded and gave the Centrist Democratic Party the opportunity to be part of a government led either by Labour or the Conservatives, party leader Bradley Murphy made the decision to join the New Conservative Coalition, putting an end to Margaret Harrison’s left-wing government and giving way to a Valkyria led by the right.
Murphy’s choice was a controversial one, almost prompting a split in the Centrist Democratic Party. Some within the party adamantly objected to any alliance with The New Right. However, there were those in the party who were just as uncomfortable participating in a government that included the Socialist Party, which would have been the case if the party went with Harrison. The split came at a critical time when the Centrist Democratic Party was seen as the queenmaker between Harrison and Kaufman.
For his part, Murphy was able to quell the internal opposition with promises of being a moderating force in the Coalition. However, as time went on, the Coalition government that the Centrist Democrats were part of led Valkyria into the Kalkara War and ended the Harrison-era investigation into alleged Valrissi fundamentalist cults in the nation’s northern reaches that had been accused of committing forced conversions, torture, and murder.
In the time since losing the 2022 general election, both the Conservatives and Centrist Democrats have spent time undergoing internal reflections. In both parties, there have been rumblings of dissent against Kaufman and Murphy for making an alliance with Chancellor, purportedly led by Conservative Jonathan Victor and Centrist Democrat Victor Cutter, both of whom once held the title of president of Qvait and have long blamed Chancellor for the collapse of the Valkyrian centre-right.
Cutter, who had once served as the president of Qvait and later as a Cabinet official in successive governments, had been long seen as a centrist politician willing to work with any party from the centre-left to the centre-right, going so far as to serve as Harrison’s intelligence secretary before the unification of Austurland and Qvait led to a major restructuring of the new unified government. Since then, Cutter served as a Centrist Democratic backbencher, often taking a greater interest in handling local issues affecting his constituency than responding to the national issues of the day.
Until 7 March 2023, when Murphy announced Cutter’s appointment as co-leader of the Centrist Democratic Party, a title that was affirmed by the party membership on 24 March. With Cutter now co-leading the party, the Centrist Democrats broke with the Coalition and promised to work with any centrist party moving forward. As a parting jab at Chancellor and her party, the two co-leaders called for “a new new right” in Valkyria.
With the Centrist Democrats breaking ranks, the Conservative Party may soon follow suit. For months, it has been reported that heated arguments have been held between party officials, with threats made to challenge Kaufman for the Conservative leadership after the party’s collapse in the 2022 election. As one Conservative MP told the VKS, the election reopened a six-year-old wound.
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