This is no time for the Tories to panic

If politicians are meant - as the late governor of New York, Mario Cuomo, held - to campaign in poetry and govern in prose, then David Cameron's Conservatives are bucking the trend. The prime minister's campaign is strikingly free of sonnets.

The Conservative effort to woo voters feels flat, pessimistic and centred around the single theme that voting Labour is too big a risk with a recovering economy. It has lapsed into sometimes crass personal attacks on the Labour leader Ed Miliband and upset unionists with its depiction of the Scottish nationalists almost as an enemy within. With the opinion polls offering no sign of victory, supporters' nerves are fraying.

Internal angst is a well-established election narrative. The 1987 Conservative campaign was punctuated by "wobbly Thursday", when party leaders clashed after a rogue opinion poll. The Conservatives went on to win that election with a thumping majority of 102 seats and a 42 per cent share of the vote. If that is how jittery a successful campaign looks, it is small wonder that Tories are worried about an election that is too close to call.

Yet the striking thing about the Conservatives over the past few weeks is actually how disciplined they have remained. There are few signs of internal rows; ministers and candidates are sticking to their lines and as yet we are not seeing the usual effort by insiders to distance themselves from a doomed campaign - perhaps because no one is yet convinced it is losing. Does the Conservative leadership know something its supporters do not? Or are they too obtuse to recognise a problem?

Whatever the reason, Tory strategists are right to defy the jitters. This is not to say the plan is right or that it is going to work in the end; the election is far too close for confidence of that level. No, they should stick to the course they have charted because there is little to gain from doing otherwise. They can improve and tweak, but ultimately the Conservatives are playing the cards they hold. They may also take solace from the words of former leader, Sir John Major, who noted: "I can't recall a campaign people thought was going well until well after it had been won."

There are many reasons for the Conservatives to resist the temptation of a handbrake turn and appease those calling for a much more positive campaign, full of blue skies and purple poetry.

The first is that national campaigns have relatively little impact. They merely help crystallise what voters were already thinking. The Conservatives have had five years to alter perceptions of themselves; the campaign can only work with the material available. After five years of playing the disciplinarian, they cannot suddenly recast themselves as compassionate optimists.

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Another argument holds that the campaign is too negative. Electoral history suggests this is a self-indulgent argument. Rising oratory and "happy days are here again" may pep up supporters but they are worthless unless they chime with public perceptions. There is also nothing inherently foolish about negative campaigning. Playing to the fears of loss-averse voters works. The public does not believe politicians' promises but it can be swayed by the fear of losing what it has. It is not pretty or poetic but it is often effective.

The bigger challenge is that the economy is not where the party hoped it would be. "In six months people will be feeling the recovery," as one Tory put it. "At the moment not enough are." Voters are not sufficiently convinced by the recovery to have much fear of putting it in jeopardy. The call for a more positive economic message is seductive, but you do not make voters feel better-off just by telling them they are.

Too blatant a campaign change will also signal panic. It says that those at the top think they are losing, and fires the starting gun on recriminations and positioning for the ensuing leadership campaign. None of these are likely to increase the Tory vote.

<>This does not preclude some small adjustments. The party would do well to rethink the central slogan of a "long-term economic plan" - a phrase seemingly lifted from the Chinese People's Congress. It plays poorly with voters who see it as code for endless austerity.

Yet the campaign is not as inflexible as it might appear. The elevation of the Scottish peril as a major theme is a response to doorstep soundings. The much derided personal attack on Mr Miliband as a back-stabber had a wider purpose which was to pull attention away from a popular Labour policy that was working for it. The attack was overdone but the gambit worked; Mr Miliband remains a drag on his party.

Another argument against a change of direction is that the real election is being fought away from the public gaze, in the few dozen marginal seats where the outcome will actually determine the election result. Here, the message is carefully micro-targeted, not least through advertising on Facebook and other social media. In these places, there are signs the Tories are doing a little better.

A late swing may still happen. If it does not, it will not be because Conservative strategists are fighting the wrong battle, but because they were never strong enough to win. The maths is against them; parliamentary arithmetic makes it easier for Labour to form the next government. The recovery is not real for enough voters. Against this, it is a measure of Labour's strategic failures that the Tories are even in with a chance. For the Conservatives, these are the hard facts of this contest. The campaign may succeed or fail, but whatever is wrong, it is too late to fix.

The writer is managing editor of ft.com

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