A Gloomy Dawn

David Cameron is almost certain to be the next prime minister of Britain. With a double-digit lead in the polls, his Conservative Party looks sure to end 12 years of Labour rule in Britain's next election, which must be called by June. In four years, he's distanced the Tories from their Thatcherite past, edged them back to the center, softened their image, and expanded their appeal. Barring disaster, he'll be taking up residence at 10 Downing Street sometime next year.

So why aren't he and his party celebrating? When the Tories met in Manchester for their annual conference earlier this month, there were few signs of the ebullience that accompanied Labour's march to victory in 1997 and the "New Dawn" of Tony Blair. Champagne was banned at official events lest the Tories appear to be partying while the economy burns. But their anxiety goes deeper. Their likely triumph will be due as much to Labour's unpopularity as to their own appeal. Despite Cameron's attempt to rebrand the party as hip, young, progressive, and green, he has yet to capture the popular imagination: one recent poll found that only 32 percent of likely Tory voters "felt positive" about the party. Nor has he sketched out a philosophy coherent enough to satisfy many. And the prize he's likely to win may be a bitter one. As Britain's presumptive next leader, he'll head an inexperienced team hobbled by a weak economy and possibly a weak mandate. In his speech in Manchester, Cameron warned of a "steep climb" ahead. It may prove even steeper than he realizes.

Start by considering the math. While the Tories are dominating the polls, those impressive figures won't easily translate into seats. Because of the way Britain's electoral districts are drawn, as well as other quirks, the system is skewed against the Conservatives. In his first victory, Blair managed to win only 43 percent of the popular vote yet secured 64 percent of the seats in Parliament. That will be almost impossible for Cameron to replicate. Given the current makeup of Westminster, the Tories need to gain another 117 seats to form a majority. That's a "massive" challenge, says party chairman Eric Pickles—so massive no party has managed it since 1931. There's even a risk the Conservatives could beat Labour but without winning more than half the seats, forcing them into a minority government. This nightmare seems especially likely if an economic recovery boosts Labour's reputation for fiscal competence.

Even if the Conservatives do win convincingly, it will still be just the start of their problems. Gordon Brown will likely bequeath him the deepest hole in public finances in Britain's postwar history—a $285 billion deficit—and an unemployment rate of 8 percent. During Blair's first campaign, he took as his anthem D:Ream's catchy "Things Can Only Get Better." Cameron knows that in the short term, at least, they're likely to get worse.

Of course, he has been working hard to turn crisis into opportunity. At the party conference, his friend and adviser George Osborne, the shadow chancellor, played on the notion of solidarity in suffering—"We're all in this together"—and cast the Tories as responsible realists. In practice that means they're likely to implement a pay freeze for all but the lowest-paid public servants (and salary cuts for ministers) as well as a hike in the pension age, and to stick to Labour's plan for a new 50 percent marginal income-tax rate for the highest earners. So far, the polls suggest that the public will accept such austerity. But they've yet to feel the real pinch.

Then there's Cameron's party. Blair swept to power with a band of like-minded M.P.s who had backed him in the grand battle for Labour's soul. Old-timers groused, but the majority bought into Blair's reforms and his rejection of the party's commitment to socialist nostrums. Cameron's party may prove less unified—many Tories, including a big share of the prospective 2010 M.P.s, remain devoted to old Thatcherite orthodoxies, says Richard Reeves of Demos, a think tank. "It is not as if there is a fresh group that will be pulling the party to the left. There is an element that is profoundly unhappy with the new social liberalism of the front bench." This faction's size remains unclear—it has so far stayed silent in the interests of winning power—but it will likely make its influence felt once victory is secure.

Europe, in particular—that old Tory bugbear—is likely to reemerge as a dangerous divider. Cameron himself sometimes talks like a Euroskeptic, opposed to closer integration, but he's no anti-Brussels zealot. By contrast, much of his party is still leery of the very idea of British membership in the EU club. A recent survey of party members by the Tory Web site ConservativeHome.com found that 39 percent favored quitting the EU altogether—a flat contradiction of party policy. Hardliners are also pushing for a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, which they see as a dangerous step toward European federalism—even though Britain has already committed itself to the agreement. Were a Cameron government to turn against the EU, it could prove hugely embarrassing and complicate relations with France and Germany. Already the Tories have come under attack for linking up with some cranky far-right Europhobes in the European Parliament.

Cameron's followers also lack experience. Blair was surrounded by fresh-faced neophytes when he took over—by 1997, Labour had been out of office for nearly 18 years—but leading "Cameroons," the coterie of like-minded types who have helped to reshape Conservative policy, look younger still. Many current Tory M.P.s have been in Parliament only since 2001 or 2005, and Reeves says that up to a third of all Conservative M.P.s elected next year will be newcomers to Westminster. Cameron's inner circle is also isolated, a small team of intimates, many from similar privileged backgrounds and with few grassroots ties. As Reeves puts it, "it is a very small tip at the top of a very big iceberg."