The "there will be more scrutiny" conventional wisdom

Andrew Rawnsley repeats the argument put forward by several Labour ministers, that the silver lining for Labour with their dismal election results will be that Tory policy will now face more scrutiny. That's lunacy. One of the biggest problems that the Conservatives have faced for a number of years is that they can't get the public to listen to their policies. That policies become unpopular as soon as they are identified as those of the Conservative Party. If their policies are now taken seriously and subjected to scrutiny that offers them the opportunity to set out a platform for government.

Beyond that, there is good evidence that the more the Tories are in the news the better they do (this is discussed frequently by Mike Smithson). Of course, there are risks for the Tories. If they screw up, as they clearly did with the Quality of Life Policy Group report, then they'll have more to lose and are more likely to be found out. However, unless they never want to form a government this is an upping of the ante that the Conservatives have to be happy about. While things clearly could go wrong and Labour could be offered a way out of their current predicatement, this isn't much of a silver lining for them.