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Famous parents; the Scots Guards; a company director. It is not surprising that Iain Duncan Smith ended up as a Conservative MP. In 2001 he was elected the party's leader and served for two troubled years.

Today he is no longer leader of the UK's parliamentary right wing. Instead he has formed a centre to promote social justice. What on earth has happened to him?

Duncan Smith's childhood (see below) may have given him a belief in helping your neighbour but it was little in evidence during most of his tenure as leader of the opposition, a position he used to attack government centralisation and public expenditure. He failed to improve the Conservative's poll ratings and was subjected to stinging criticism from within and repeated calls for his resignation. Then in 2002, he grabbed the headlines by spending some time in one of Britain's most deprived areas, Easterhouse in Glasgow.

How did this come about? A number of his aides, particularly Tim Montgomerie, were exponents of "compassionate conservatism" which accepted a Christian obligation to help the needy. In more pragmatic terms, they argued that the Conservatives had to shake off the harsh image that had cost them votes. They therefore persuaded Duncan Smith to take the Conservative message into deprived neighbourhoods.

The minister of Easterhouse Baptist Church, Sandy Weddell, hosted the visit. Initially he took Duncan Smith to a local project, Family Action in Rogerfield & Easterhouse (Fare). As a member of its committee, I observed that Duncan Smith's readiness to listen impressed local residents. He expressed admiration for the services on offer and surprise that community projects received so little funding from statutory bodies. Above all, he noted that Fare was run by residents, including unemployed people and single parents, the very kind who had been condemned by Thatcherites.

IDS promised to come again, and did. He toured Easterhouse and subsequently went to other deprived parts of the UK. Thereafter his speeches gave prominence to poverty and the press wrote about his "Easterhouse conversion." A month later, he published a book which stated that care of the poor "should be our top priority".¹ The Conservative conference of 2002 was the first one to give prominence to poverty, social problems and community action.

Was this conversion simply politically expedient? Or was it a result of a genuine change in him? I believe it was the latter. He said to me, "Politicians tend to live in the narrow world of Westminster. We meet think tanks, discuss theories, and trade insults in the Commons. None of this helps the poor. When I visited Glasgow, I saw the poverty, the crime, the drug abuse among a swathe of forgotten people. I felt I had to do something. I realised that residents had given up on national politics and were seeking their own solutions. I came away a changed man."

Duncan Smith lost the leadership of the Conservatives in November 2003. He could have retreated into a few lush directorships, a seat in the Lords, the chair of some prestigious agency. Not so. "When I lost the leadership, I met with Tim (Montgomerie) and told him 'I can't lose the social justice agenda, that's the reason I now exist in politics. How can we continue it?' Tim came back with the idea of a Centre for Social Justice."

The centre, with three staff and Duncan Smith as chair, was launched on 29 June. Its draft brochure lists three core goals, "to reward poverty-fighting projects which really work", "to help people live independently of the state" and "to equip a new generation (of Conservatives) to fight poverty".

It comes over rather more dynamically in Duncan Smith's conversation. "The purpose is to keep the Conservative party focused on deprived areas," he told me. "But the Centre must not be a distant think tank. It will have staff who are practically involved with poor people and it will recognise that communities already have answers. It must be prepared to produce ideas that traditional Tories may not like. For instance, I met elderly people in deprived areas whose problems cannot be solved by better environments. They may need higher pensions."

The Centre for Social Justice is an important initiative. If it succeeds in promoting ideas within the Conservative party to counter social deprivation, and if Duncan Smith attracts more Conservative politicians determined to counter poverty, then it will be breaking the party mould. But its strategies have limitations.

For a start, it never defines poverty. What is the basic income beneath which no citizen should drop? Once this is stated, how can poverty be abolished? Duncan Smith and his colleagues appear to think that the best approach is to provide families with the skills to find decent jobs. But in times of recession even those with skills may be unemployed. Further, there are some citizens who cannot fit into the free market economy. In short, poverty can be overcome only if the state ensures that all people have an adequate income.


Another limitation is that Duncan Smith and his colleagues are too influenced by the US. The brochure carries a photo of Duncan Smith with President Bush. On trips to the US, they have been impressed by voluntary bodies that work with lone parents, drug abusers and delinquents. They indicate that these kind of agencies should have priority in Britain. Yet these financially well-supported agencies can pick and choose their recipients.

Simultaneously, they play down the fact that poverty in the US is at developing world levels and that crime, unemployment and drug abuse rates remain high. Far from importing policy from across the pond, the Centre for Social Justice should be telling the US to improve its state services.

Afinal limitation, and it's early days yet, is that the centre has not delivered original proposals that will win the approval of poor citizens. My suggestion is that it should argue for the abolition of Social Fund loans for essential domestic items for claimants, and for a return to grants. Also, if, as Duncan Smith promises, the centre provides a means of financially backing locally run community projects - and not just the powerful national voluntary societies - then it will have two radical proposals which New Labour refuses to support.

Duncan Smith now possesses a compassionate determination. Recently he was interviewed by David Frost, who wanted to focus on the party leadership and Europe while Duncan Smith kept returning to social justice. Herein lies his dilemma. If he makes social justice a major Conservative theme, he may well alienate some supporters who are not interested in poverty.

If he advocates policies that entail higher public expenditure then he will be at odds with Michael Howard and senior Tories who want less expenditure and lower taxation. But IDS will not easily abandon his new mission, which suggests he will soon be stimulating yet more internal conflict within the Conservative party.

¹ I Duncan Smith & G Streeter (eds), There Is Such A Thing As Society, Politicos, 2002

Making of Duncan Smith

Iain Duncan Smith's father was a second world war fighter pilot, and his mother was a ballerina before starting a family. Iain was born in 1954. He recalls "a very happy childhood". He says that after his father left the RAF he did not settle into the cut-throat competition of private business and was not interested in politics. However, he was always ready "to help war-time colleagues who had fallen on hard times." This commitment to helping others, together with his mother's practical Christianity, made a big impression on the young Iain. In 1975, Duncan Smith joined the army. He served in Northern Ireland where the Troubles stimulated his interest in politics. He left the army and, after management posts, was elected to the safe Conservative seat of Chingford and Woodford Green in 1992. He is married to Betsy. In the Commons, Duncan Smith made his mark as an anti-European and became leader of the Conservative party in 2001. He was replaced as leader by Michael Howard in November 2003.