"The opening speeches by the Tory leader, Kemi Badenoch, and her shadow chancellor, Mel Stride, to their party conference were loud with conviction but thin on substance. They felt like ritual incantations in a world turned upside down. Mr Stride's pitch 47bn of savings via welfare cuts and business rebates is an empty promise given the party's standing in the opinion polls. But it is a tenet of modern-day Toryism to preach austerity to the poor and indulgence to the wealthy."
"The Tory party faces an existential moment. If an election were held tomorrow, some polls have the Conservatives in fourth place in terms of seats having never finished lower than second in a general election since the 1830s. Their voters are turning away to support Reform UK or just not turning out. But why have we got here? A backward glance offers an explanation. From David Cameron onwards, every Tory leader has faced the same dilemma: how to reconcile globalisation's promises with its discontents."
Kemi Badenoch and Mel Stride delivered forceful conference speeches heavy on rhetoric but light on substantive policy. Stride proposed £47bn of savings through welfare cuts and business rebates, a pledge unlikely to be credible given poor opinion-poll standing. Modern Toryism continues to emphasize austerity for the poor and benefits for the wealthy. The Conservative party faces electoral peril, with some polls placing it fourth and traditional voters defecting to Reform UK or abstaining. Successive leaders from David Cameron onward struggled to reconcile globalisation’s promises with its social and territorial costs, revealing a technocratic failure that underestimated those consequences.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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