Can Mr Duncan Smith bring today's Tebbits and Whitelaws together?

If the party is to regain power, it needs two kinds of voters; but one is difficult to appeal to without alienating the other

Such was his love for Germany, said Georges Clemenceau, the French prime minister who insisted on German humiliation at Versailles, that he wished there were several of them. Tony Blair thinks the same about the Tory Party, and it was announced this week that some young Tories agreed with him. They too would like to split their party. Unlike the so-called "spotty-faced youths" whom Norman Tebbit would like Iain Duncan Smith to sack, these youngsters are so obscure that no one has put a name to them. All we know is their judgement is more juvenile than their years.

And along with them is Rupert Darwall, who at least has a name, though no one has heard of him either. A decade ago, he was an ineffective political adviser at the Treasury, for about five minutes. Now he has written a pamphlet, claiming that the Tories are neglecting the issue of tax, which served Margaret Thatcher so well back in the 1980s. His argument has only one problem. When Mrs Thatcher came to power, the top rate of tax was 98 per cent. Tax rates had to be tackled. They were, and the world moved on. Today's Tories calling for a return to the 1980s is pointless. The party cannot prosper by trying to re-slay long-decomposed dragons.

Naturally enough, the Tory high command is irritated that the press should pay so much attention to thoughtless, self-serving interventions from irrelevant figures. But a lesson can be learnt. Last week's news stories were the final refutation of those Tories, such as Francis Maude, who have argued that the party should forget about policies and concentrate on tone of voice. That is a snare and a delusion. Unless the party starts defining itself by strong statements on big issues, the press will give headline room to each and every Tory who wants to peddle his obsessions. It does not matter how mellifluous the tone of voice, unless you have something today.

The latest indications are that Mr Duncan Smith is aware that tone of voice is not enough. He has come back from his Tuscan holiday convinced of the need for forceful policy statements. He will be urging his colleagues to start seizing the agenda now, rather than waiting for the party conference in early October. He is also convinced that the campaign to "help the vulnerable'' has mileage, given the experience of George Bush's successful initiative to "leave no child behind''.

On that point, not all senior Tories agree with their leader. Some feel that though a campaign to assist the vulnerable might be an admirable attempt to capture the moral high ground, it does not reassure traditional Tory supporters, many of whom are quite at ease on low moral ground.

This debate about morality and tactics brings into focus one problem which the Tories have not yet solved. How can they simultaneously appeal to two important, yet contrasting, groups of former Conservative supporters? If the party is to regain power it needs them both, but it is difficult to appeal to the one without alienating the other. The first lot consists of upper-middle class voters who live in the home counties, in seats which the Tories used to be able to take for granted. Some of them read The Independent. These once-faithful Tories live in large detached houses and care about the inner-city poor. They drive sizeable cars – an Audi or a BMW – and are concerned about the environment. If an opinion pollster invited them to state their political priorities, they would immediately mention the public services. They also think they are paying enough in tax.

Their lifestyles and political pretensions contain mockable contradictions, yet it would be too easy to dismiss them as hypocrites. Though they are determined to remain comfortable, they do not believe that personal comfort is a sufficient life-objective. They want their electoral choices to express some connection with a generous approach to great events. They are social liberals, though they would prefer their sons to go out with girls. Whatever their views on the euro, they dislike xenophobia, or anything smacking of racism.

In earlier years, such people had no choice. As long as the Labour Party was controlled by socialists – not to mention lunatics – they felt it thoroughly unsafe to vote anything except Conservative. Then came the disintegration of the Major government and the arrival of Tony Blair. In 1997 they moved over to Mr Blair's camp with a mixture of hope and anxiety. They hoped that he would fulfil his promises on the public services; they feared that he might revert to old Labour.

In the event, he has done neither. But these upper-middle class, dissident Tories can still forgive him for failing to transform the public services, because his heart seems to be in the right place and old Labour holds no dangers. Admittedly , the stealth taxes are beginning to bite and the gravel drives are growing anxious about their pension funds. That said, nothing is the matter with their personal economies that would not be cured by a 1,000-point rise in the Footsie 100. They are still not ready to give up on Mr Blair – and anyway, they still have no idea what the Tories stand for. Who is this Duncan Smith chap and is he up to the job? Why should they trust him?

The same questions are being asked at the other end of the middle classes – but different answers are expected. Here, the family newspaper is sometimes The Daily Telegraph but more often the Daily Mail. These second-hand Mondeo drivers like the Mail for its angry voice; they often feel angry themselves. Angry about the way the country is going; angry about rule from Europe. Angry that our big cities are being overrun by immigrants, asylum-seekers, social-security scroungers and other criminals. Angry, because since Maggie, no one seems interested in standing up for their views.

These truculent members of the lower-middle class would never have voted Labour, and they do not like Tony Blair. They think that he is a smarmy git, and as for that wife. But the Conservatives: what are they offering? All the Tories seem to want to talk about is homosexuality. These sometime-loyal Tory Mondeo men always thought that most politicians were a bit odd. For odd, now read queer. They had inevitably voted Tory until 1997, when they decided to stay at home. Ditto in 2001; by now, abstention is becoming a habit. They will need a good reason to break it in favour of the Tories, and they might even be prepared to consider voting Liberal – as long as they do not find out much about the Liberal Party.

If these two groups of sometime-Tory voters were to meet socially, they would instantly decide that they had nothing in common. Iain Duncan Smith has the problem of persuading them to cast their vote in the same ballot box. Nearly 20 years ago, Willie Whitelaw and Norman Tebbit worked together in Margaret Thatcher's Cabinet, an alliance which helped to make that Cabinet so effective. If Mr Duncan Smith is ever to form a Cabinet, he too will have to bring the Whitelaws and the Tebbits back together.