It is 13 years since the Conservative Party hosted a seaside autumn party conference. Next year – after going virtual – the prime minister should support struggling coastal communities, along with the great English seaside, by returning to the tradition of politics-by-the-sea. It was on 11 October 1985 when Margaret Thatcher told conference that “We all love Blackpool”. No longer. That the Tories have not held a conference in Blackpool since 2007 – and Labour since 2002 – is symptomatic of how paranoid party leaders have become with being associated with the metropolitan gospel of British decline-ism. In a notorious Times column, Matthew Parris described seaside towns like Clacton as resorts “trying not to die”, being symbols of failure and social depression. This is the wrong approach. One of Labour’s greatest mistakes at the last election was to ignore the seaside vote in towns like Blackpool, where homelessness and disadvantaged pupils are well above the national average. Coastal co...