Lynton Crosby: the man who really won the election for the Tories

There were several critics from within the Conservative party of how the secretive Australian was masterminding their campaign. Not any more

“At its absolute simplest, a campaign is simply finding out who will decide the outcome … where are they, what matters to them, and how do you reach them?” Eighteen months ago, in a bland meeting room in Mayfair in central London, the Conservatives’ expensive, controversial, now extravagantly vindicated, hired election strategist Lynton Crosby offered this advice at a rare public masterclass, for the Patchwork Foundation, an independent political charity.

The usually secretive Australian’s hour-long talk is on YouTube; but fewer than 2,000 people have watched it. Other excerpts to which non-Tories might profitably have paid more attention include: “Tone is very important when you’re executing a negative campaign … Be clear and contrasting”; and, “Ignore most of the opinion polls that you see in the newspapers, because they are so simplistic.”

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