This could be the salvation of the Tories

The revival in their fortunes is significant and, for Duncan Smith, could not be better timed

At the Conservative Winter Ball, on Monday night, the mood was hardly euphoric. Iain Duncan Smith was received with polite applause, and the standing ovation from among the 1,000 or so guests after his speech was limited to two members of the shadow cabinet, Howard Flight and Nigel Evans. But, equally, there was a tribal willingness on the part of guests to be parted with substantial sums of money and a healthy sum for fighting marginal seats was raised.

The gathering did not know about the latest opinion poll showing the Tories within one per cent of Labour. Had a sharp-eyed press officer been able to impart such information, no doubt most of the shadow cabinet would have been dancing on the tables. Of course, it is easy to pooh-pooh such polls and we were here, once before, in the autumn of 2000 during the fuel protest. A mere nine months later Mr Blair was safely re-elected without a scratch.

But the importance of this recent poll has possible implications to the benefit of IDS that could certainly transform his own long-term survival, and even his party's fortunes. For weeks the main focus has been on the narrowing gap between the Tory flatline in popularity ratings of around 30 per cent and the improved showings of the Liberal Democrats, at about 25 per cent. While the latter will be still be delighted to have maintained their consistently improved rating, the danger of the Liberal Democrats overtaking the Tories seems to have been averted – for the time being, at least.

The real story, of course, is the worst collapse in support for the Labour Party in a decade. Clearly the prospect of war, against the overwhelming opposition of party and public opinion, has been the catalyst for this decline. Nobody supposes, however, that Mr Blair is going to change tack or policy.

As the former cabinet minister Michael Portillo correctly observed on the Today programme, the Prime Minister is no longer in thrall to focus groups or opinion polls and is a totally different character to the model that he presented in 1997, when he was anxious to please everyone. Now Mr Blair is prepared to take risks, and there is more than a hint of recklessness about his current style. Of course, he advertised this at last autumn's party conference when he said "we are at our best when we are at our boldest".

The evidence is growing of his complete detachment from the Labour Party and backbench MPs, and these latest polls are not going to influence him to change course from the inevitable path to war. Mr Blair has the formal protection of the official Opposition and probably feels that the support he enjoys from IDS on terrorism and Iraq enables him to take a cavalier approach to his own party.

Few now doubt that Mr Blair and George Bush have made up their minds that conflict with Iraq is inevitable. The possible long-term destruction of Nato, the United Nations and the European Union by Messrs Chirac, and Schröder – aided and abetted by President Putin of Russia– has virtually put paid to any chance of these organisations exercising a restraining influence on Mr Blair and Mr Bush.

If anything is guaranteed to turn sceptical British opinion in favour of action, it is the extraordinary behaviour of the French and Germans and their war of words with the American Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld over the past few days. Until now the British public has registered mostly disquiet and discomfort at the tone of the rhetoric from Washington. But somehow, France has an ability to get up the nose of British public opinion that is even greater than the US's, and Jacques Chirac's chauvinistic stance gives a whole new meaning to the term "French resistance".

This leaves Mr Blair banking on military success and the hope that a relatively short campaign will prove decisive. He will pray that the public will be swayed by the total confusion of the various international forums – which might then make unilateral British and American action more palatable to all but his own party diehards in the constituencies and Parliament. This really is very high risk, with the possibility of the Labour Party suffering the kind of fissure that the Tories suffered in the 1990s over Europe. Such is his current state of belief in his case – and his natural loathing for the traditional roots of his own party – that he seems impervious to these risks.

So far, Labour supporters and parliamentarians have been prepared to forgive him his tepid relationship with the party's roots on the basis that his is their chief vote-winner. But if they perceive that he is losing the electoral Midas touch, and if the conflict backfires, his days will be numbered.

Something in the Downing Street water seems to embolden powerful Prime Ministers after they have been in office for six years to ignore their relationships with their parties. But MPs see less of them in social circumstances. Backbenchers who were once ministers are more forthright and MPs who realise that they are not going to be ministers also become more willing to express their real views.

Watching backbench reaction to last week's statement by Geoff Hoon on air-force deployment, I was struck by the willingness of Labour MPs to challenge the Government. As a Tory MP, I mocked them six years ago for their slavish adherence to pager control and their susceptibility to the Millbank control freakery. All that had gone. For the first time I saw the seeds being sown that led to a similar dysfunction between Margaret Thatcher and her MPs when they felt that she was the main obstacle that stood between them and re-election in November 1990.

But the revival in Tory fortunes is significant, and, for IDS, it could not be better timed. It has not been universally welcomed by his internal party detractors. "Oh no. This is just what we don't need. At this rate he will survive the summer and we'll be lumbered with him at the next general election." wailed one backbencher who is convinced the survival of IDS will yet rescue Labour. Certainly the Tory waters have now become as muddied as Labour's. And it is probably the case that their healthier poll rating is due to events outside their influence.

It is not easy, however, to make a convincing case for dumping a leader who can say, in spite of all the traumas, that he has narrowed the gap with Labour to just 1 per cent – even if few in his party believe it is anything to do with him. So one thing is for sure. IDS will not fall on his sword.

The local and regional elections in early May still remain difficult hurdles, but with Labour in the doldrums, and a spring in the step of Tory voters, IDS could yet stall a motion of no confidence. Tory MPs, who only a few weeks ago might have been prepared to put their heads over the parapet, might now become worried about the opprobrium they would suffer in their constituency associations if IDS managed finally to get on the front foot. And if he survives May, then he is virtually guaranteed to lead the party into the next general election.

IDS has maintained a consistent stand throughout, but he also has some on his own backbenches who are anti-war. He could reasonably lead calls for a debate, however, on a substantive motion before military action becomes a fait accompli. It is an irony that IDS suddenly looks a little more secure in his job – and Mr Blair a little less in his.

mrbrown@pimlico.freeserve.co.uk