Socialism defeated - again.
The outcome of #GE2019 was not a surprise, the surprise was the size of the Conservative’s majority and the consequence for Labour. A rejection of socialism and once and for all of the Remainer narrative that Britain had turned against leaving the EU since the Referendum of 2016.
The Conservative landslide majority was a surprise, I had thought a 30 seat majority likely, with many traditional Labour voters rejecting the metropolitan elites prescription for the economy as unbelievable and undeliverable. The Labour leadership contempt for their traditional voting base that they could be bought off with loads of free stuff and giveaways whilst surrendering control of big chunks of their lives to the State.
The Conservatives are now the party of the working class, middle class and entrepreneur class whilst Labour have become the party of the liberal metropolitan and academic elite who can afford to gamble with our people’s livelihoods whilst enjoying the protection of their State salaries and gold plated pensions.
In Medway, an outstanding result by any measure for our three sitting Conservative MP’s, Rehman Chishti, Kelly Tolhurst and Tracey Crouch romping home with big increases in their majorities and 62% of the vote between them leaving labour candidates Andy Stamp, Vince Maple and Theresa Murray irrelevant. Labour only success on the night was retention of Canterbury by the not so genial Rosie Duffield.
Labour’s attempt to cast the “rich” as the only losers who would pay for its manifesto promises, was so easily exposed when it became clear that married people, pensioners with shares receiving dividends, anyone with a pension scheme and almost every small business owner would pay much more for Labour’s socialist agenda. The lack of detail on the true cost of Labour’s manifesto billions fooled no-one, especially their own supporters.
Labour’s Remainers were gleefully expecting a big victory so that they could grab control of Brexit and then quietly kill it off whilst genial Jeremy was going through the motions of attempting to get a better deal from the European Commission.
EU loving establishment types, John Major, Tony Blair, Michael Heseltine, Dominic Grieve, David Gaulke, John Bercow, luvvies such as Hugh Grant, Lily Allen were all put to the sword by the patriotic working class, described as stupid and uneducated by the ultra-Remainers.
The new Conservative administration has a mandate to get on with Brexit and to move the nation on from dealing with the 2008 financial crash. Boris Johnson needs to ensure that his ‘One Nation’ brand of Conservatism does not repeat the mistakes of the post-war period of ineffective Government intervention.
Lower, more efficient business taxes and reasonable de-regulation can and will make Britain more competitive, which will increase economic activity, create more jobs and generate a higher tax take for the Exchequer which will allow for further investment in public services and infrastructure.
This Conservative Government will need to encourage more house building of all tenure types, this will means painful planning reform, get on with reforming the culture of the NHS, to make it totally focused on patients, as well as an increase in funding and the time has come to take decisive steps to deal with the issues in the Care sector.
Updating Britain’s infrastructure must be a priority, and we must not repeat the mistakes of Crossrail, more funding for policing, education particularly skills based further education, so long as it meets the needs of business and a root and branch review of where the Government intervenes in markets to ensure that it is not creating perverse outcomes for consumers and taxpayers. Shared ownership in housing and the energy price cap are not working.
Finally, we must stop doing things on the cheap and all of us need to be prepared to pay more for better services provided in the public and private sectors. Travelling on business regularly, I am struck by just how much better certain services are. In Latvia always on 4G mobile broadband almost wherever you are puts Britain to shame. It’s a surprise if you can get 3G in Medway as just one example.
The battle of ideas has been won, now its time to deliver for the nation.
