Lynton Crosby, the Australian political strategist used anti-abortion and anti-immigration standpoints successfully for ex-PM John Howard in Australia.

Crosby became ex-Tory leader Michael Howard's strategist for the 2005 election. They briefly tried to inject moral panic about abortion into the campaign with the Daily Hate headlining some typically misogynist stuff. The abortion strategy fell on its arse and it was quietly dropped. Britain is very pro-choice, with supporters of the main three party being so by significant margins. But even so, Crosby's strategy showed that politicos are willing to play some nasty games to see if they get traction.

One aspect of Crosby's strategy which did get traction was the anti-immigration one. The 2005 Tory campaign went down the subtle racism route, but it didn't gain electoral success as the economy was still growing and the memories of Tory government still seemed not that long ago.

The anti-immigration strategy was furthered as a way of overcoming Labour's post-2005 poll lead and has been much more central to political debate since. The economic depression allowed the anti-immigration proponents to disingenuously tie immigration to the exacerbation of unemployment, and as a result it enabled the far-right to benefit from 'mainstream' anti-immigration rhetoric.

On the other hand, political name-calling does occur here. The right-wing rags frequently and most bizarrely refer to New Labour as "Stalinists" and "Marxists." Another common anti-Labour epithet is ZANU Labour (a play on Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF), as if New Labour represents a mix of Maoist thought and black nationalism.

There are concerns about civil liberties. The present Labour government and the last Tory government both unsuccessfully tried to introduce a national ID database and card. Detention without trial for "suspected terrorists" remains very controversial, indeed it caused violence in Northern Ireland when it was used there 35 years ago. Anti-terrorist legislation has been used by police to harass journalists, political activists and police whistleblowers. We do have our problems here too.

Teabagging isn't talked about here, since it's a private matter up to consenting individuals