What does the Conservative Party stand for?
It’s a question that many of us have been asking over recent times.
It used to be led by a belief that the people are big and the state is small; increasingly, it seems that the state cannot do enough.
Tories have increased the tax burden to a size not seen since the king of nationalisation; socialist Clement Attlee was in Number 10.
To be fair to Rishi Sunak, there are clear consequences in starting and stopping the world’s economy each time some new coronavirus variant rears its ugly head.
There was a clear cost to the lockdown strategy; not only has it hampered the life chances of the youngest in society, with Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi admitting this morning that the closure of schools was a mistake, but it created a hell of a lot of hardship for the rest of us too.
Aaron Chown
The borrowing for furlough, for support of this business or that business, on the Covid fraud or the PPE and vaccines, none of this was debt-free. Nothing in life is cost, or consequence, free.
But we’re not all in this together. Not if you’re in Northern Ireland anyway.
To give it its full title, the Conservative and Unionist Party, the Conservative Party has forgotten the importance of the unionist part of its name.
If the Tories aren’t there to jealously guard the Act of Union, then who is?
But in the Chancellor’s spring statement, we heard from the horse’s mouth that he would scrap VAT on energy efficiency measures like solar panels, expensive heat pumps and insulation installation for five years.
POOL New
Only, Northern Ireland, de facto inside the EU’s single market thanks to the Northern Ireland Protocol, won’t be free to enjoy these measures.
We have to ask the EU very kindly if Northern Ireland can zero rate solar panels. Is it any wonder that there’s a bitter sense of betrayal in Northern Ireland?
And speaking of these new net-zero compatible measures.
The idea that that’s going to help out Shirley and Arthur down the road, who are struggling to keep the lights on, isn’t laughable actually, it’s offensive.
We need gas when all we get is hot air by this Government. Make no mistake; the energy measures announced won’t make a difference.
I really don’t know how families that are just about managing are going to get through the rest of this year. But hey, at least the Government are scrapping planning rules for new windmills on your green spaces.
And folks, that’s not to say that the Labour Party, or the Lib Dems, remember them? Are offering you anything any better.
All they seem to have come up with is a proposed ‘one-off’ windfall tax on the profits of UK oil and gas companies to help a nation struggling to pay its bills.
Bills are set to rise even further once the price cap is lifted later this year. Now you might think that sounds fair enough, right? Why shouldn’t these giants of energy industry give us some of their billions?
All you end up doing there folks is raising costs to consumers, you prevent any innovation within the industry itself, prevent thousands of new jobs and why should any new kid on the block try and challenge the big boys in the energy market if they think they’re going to be whacked by purportedly one-off taxes every time they make a profit?
We’d be chopping off our foot to solve an itch.
When our economy needs a brand new pair of running trainers and an owner willing to give it the freedom and flexibility to scratch that itch and sprint ahead in the global economic rat race.
It isn’t just the Conservative Party I dare say, I think as a nation we’ve become a something for nothing one, we’ve forgotten that our ancestors put the great in Great Britain through yes, good fortune, but also hard work, talent and recognising that these are islands are home to great people, with a proud past and real chances in the future.
Let’s not squander them.