Elections

Luke Springthorpe, director of Conservative Progress, outlines why he thinks the Conservative Party lost seats in the general election.

1) Brexit became a fig leaf barely concealing the fact that there was virtually nothing there behind it. The manifesto offered nothing to excite anyone about voting Conservative and certainly didn’t offer enough to people who voted to Remain in the referendum.

2) The national campaign stopped talking about how Conservatives would aspire to make people better off or to make a case about being on the side of the strivers – and nor was any effort made to assure people about public services. This was a huge error.

When I cast my vote in this general election I will, for the most part, be voting against something rather than for anything. I don’t endorse Theresa May’s illiberal instincts, her paternalistic philosophy or desire for economic interventionism; nor do I think her Brexit strategy is grounded in what’s best for the economy. During this campaign, she has proven to be poor performer who is uncomfortable with scrutiny and weak under pressure. It has all been very unimpressive.

In truth, no political party commands my unconditional loyalty; politics is not football. If there was an optimistic, leader prepared to defend Neoliberalism and globalisation, who believed in a market based relationship with the EU, leading a capable Party they would have my enthusiastic vote, but there isn’t. I feel so uninspired that in the past I may have just stayed at home.

There is however a VERY large but. As in: but what about the alternative? I feel compelled to cast a vote against the Far Left Labour leadership and their zealous acolytes. I detest their ideology and i’m repulsed by their numerous questionable affiliations and sympathies. The populist Labour manifesto is based on a utopianist economic policy which is economically ridiculous in its profligacy and cynical in its attempt to promise the world to every voter group. It may be chock full of sellable doorstep policies but it’s rife with terrible ideas, from the National Education Service to the National Investment Bank and nationalisation program.

Worst of all, I don’t believe for a moment that if given the chance to consolidate their power, the Corbynites won’t go much further than suggested in their manifesto and attempt to implement their long cherished socialistic economic beliefs and ride roughshod through Britain’s institutions. I dread to think of what state the country would end up in.

Every vote for Labour will be perceived by the leadership as an endorsement of Corbyn and the Party’s current direction and I want to see them ousted so that Labour can become a competent and reasonable opposition and a government in waiting. That’s better for this country and its political system, and this may be the last chance to prevent Labour becoming permanently captured by extremists.

I don’t buy into the image of Corbyn as a kindly old man with some eccentric beliefs; he is a dogmatic extremist with a warped moral compass. It seems tedious to go over it again, we’ve all read a hundred articles laying out the case against him but it bears repeating until there is no longer any threat of this man becoming our Prime Minister.

This is a man who supported the IRA and is now lying about supporting the peace process ; he talks as if he was an integral part of it but he was nothing of the sort. This is a man who expressed sympathies with Hamas and Hezbollah by inviting them to Parliament and called them his ‘friends’. Who took money to appear on the propaganda channel of the Iranian regime five times. The Iranian regime, it should be remembered, is a totalitarian theocracy that executes dissenters and gays and is vehemently anti-Semitic, not to mention oppressive of women. None of that matters though, he is happy to be a useful idiot for anyone who is against the West.

So many hardcore Corbynites are frothing at the mouth anti-Semites which is disconcerting and very telling. There is something very wrong when a large poster featuring Theresa May wearing Star of David earrings in unfurled as if this was completely normal and acceptable, and not something reserved for neo-Nazis. The problem is, Corbyn doesn’t just tolerate this; he is one of the root causes. He whitewashed the investigation into this clear issue within the Labour Party so he can hardly be that concerned.

Here we again have to look at the people and causes he associates himself with. He has supported Raed Salah, a Jew hating Islamist who spreads the Blood Libel myth and claims they were behind 9/11. This kindly old socialist has praised him repeatedly, saying ‘’Salah’s is a voice that must be heard’, really? Seriously? Not surprising from a Hamas sympathiser I suppose, the group with an explicitly genocidal charter that rules out a peaceful solution to the Israeli-Palestine issue and makes it clear that killing Jews is an express aim of their supporters. A man who invited them to Parliament and praised them as “serious and hard working” is our potential Prime Minister… crazy times.

The team working under Corbyn are a sorry lot that shouldn’t be anywhere near government. We have the utterly vile extremist Marxist John McDonnell, a ‘bad, bad, bastard’ in the thoroughly apt words of Reaction editor Iain Martin, looking to take control of the UK’s economy. The decision to choose Diane Abbott, yet another IRA supporter as well as a Mao apologist, has proven to be disastrous. As his Communications Director he appointed a Stalinist, Seamus Milne, an enthusiastic apologist for the Soviet Union and the German Democratic Republic. He then judged it reasonable to hire Andrew Murray, a Communist who has defended Stalin and North Korea, as a campaign advisor.

Beyond that the dregs of the Labour Party make up his Cabinet because most of his MP’s can’t stand him and don’t believe he should be their leader, never mind Prime Minister.

Aside from the people, it’s the policies I cannot endorse. The Conservative’s baffling failure to run a campaign based on the economy left an open goal for Corbynite Labour to promise the world to the electorate. These longstanding admirers of the socialist alternative as exemplified by basket cases like Venezeula and Cuba, have an opportunity to transform Britain in ways they have dreamed about for decades. It’s the road to ruin. In their quest to remould Britain into a socialist country they plan to borrow billions; it will be an expensive failure. The size of the deficit and the national debt after achieving so many bad outcomes from their good intentions does not bear thinking about.

The putrid Far Left cannot be allowed to govern Britain. This catastrophe must be averted. They need to lose and lose badly to prove how unpopular they are, to expose their failures and increase the chances of loosening their grip on the Labour Party. That is why I am casting my vote against them.

Ben is the Conservatives for Liberty Director of Online Communications.  Follow him on Twitter: @TheScepticIsle

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The views expressed in this article are that of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Conservatives for Liberty

It’s become increasingly clear that libertarians are losing the battle for the heart of the Conservative Party – never more so than on the publication of ‘our’ latest election manifesto:

“We must reject the ideological templates provided by the socialist left and the libertarian right and instead embrace the mainstream view that recognises the good that government can do.”

In 2013 Conservatives for Liberty was founded to argue for freedom and economic Liberalism within the Conservative Party, partly in response to Cameron’s woolly centrist positions. Today, the Cameron years look like a golden age of tax cutting glory.

In this election we will of course be backing the Conservative Party; Corbynite Socialism would be ruinous. This manifesto is disappointing and, in places, very worrying; but we must oppose the Far Left agenda of the Labour Party.

At 88 pages long the manifesto has a huge amount of policy and detail, so I’ve pulled out the best and worst bits I’ve found.

The best bits

Scrapping the second part of Leveson, a serious threat to the freedom of the press, is very welcome. As is getting rid of the hated Fixed Term Parliaments Act (the uselessness of which is shown by the fact that we are having a General Election right now).

The manifesto includes plans to make ID compulsory for voting and reform postal voting to improve the security of the ballot. On democracy, there are also plans to introduce FPTP elections for Police and Crime Commissioners and the new Mayors.

Scrapping the pensions triple-lock is welcomed by Conservatives for Liberty. Yes, we must look after our elderly but this must be balanced against affordability and the burden on working-age people. Limiting this to a ‘double-lock’ – where rises are based on whichever is the highest of average earnings or inflation – is welcome protection for both pensioners and taxpayers.

Means-testing winter fuel allowance: we like this because handing cash for heating to well-off pensioners doesn’t make any sense. If only the government would go ahead and scrap other universal benefits…

In the same vein, free school meals for all infant school children is nonsensical, diverting cash from where it is most needed to pay for middle class kids’ meals. May says scrapping this will help free up and extra £1bn to invest in education – ensuring no school is worse off in cash terms with the new schools funding formula. Also on education, the manifesto includes commitments to open more free schools and to allow grammar schools.

On Brexit: May confirms the intention to leave both the Single Market and Customs Union. This puts us on track for the clean Brexit Conservatives for Liberty advocates – and the country needs.

The worst bits

The pledge to bring net migration figures down has proved to be folly – it should be dropped. And if not dropped, students should not be included in the figures. Retaining this pledge is simply setting the party up for failure – and ignores the benefits of immigration.

Charging companies for employing non-EU nationals is a thing which shouldn’t exist – nevermind doubling the charge from £1,000 to £2,000. This charge hits companies employing skilled non-EU migrants, which often operate in parts of the economy (e.g. tech) where we have skills shortages and which fuel growth in the economy.

A pledge to increase the National Living Wage to 60% of median earnings by 2020 will have potentially disastrous consequences for the economy and people struggling to get into work; and add to the cost of delivering public services.

Legislating to make company boards include either a director from the workforce, form an employee advisory council, or assign employee representation to a non-exec director. May will also introduce a right for employees to request (and presumably get) information on the future direction of the company.

The manifesto maintains the commitment to spend 0.7% of GNI on international aid – something we believe should have been dropped.

Outlines of plans to regulate the energy market – one of the most regulated ‘markets’ in the UK already – are not very promising. It includes plans to make every household be offered a smart meter and additional caps to ‘protect’ prices.

The ‘we’ll see’

The pledge to continue raising thresholds for the personal allowance and 40p income tax rate are to be welcomed – but we remain concerned about what those rates (and other tax rates) will be by the end of the parliament. We know that lower taxes help to stimulate a healthy economy, often resulting in higher tax receipts – this should be a natural Conservative instinct.

A pledge to simplify the tax system for the self-employed and small businesses is positive – but the manifesto lacks detail on how this will be achieved.

The manifesto also includes some steps towards striking trade deals around the world, including nine new trade commissioners posts, reconvening the Trade Board, and supporting businesses to take up opportunities round the world, along with a commitment to promote free trade around the world. We’re not sure how May can simultaneously interfere in business and introduce regulation at home, whilst promoting free trade abroad.

On defence, the manifesto includes a commitment to continue spending 2% of GDP on defence, along with a pledge to increase the budget by 0.5% above inflation every year. However, many defence experts have warned that not enough is being spent on defence, and our armed forces’ capability is being harmed.

Dropping the pledge not to raise taxes sends a chill down our spines. We’ve already seen that Philip Hammond would have liked to raise National Insurance, so a ‘general commitment to not raise taxes’ is not good enough. If there is one thing the electorate should be able to rely on, it’s that voting Conservative means voting for lower taxes. Not anymore.

A pledge to eradicate the deficit by 2025 is worthy – except for taking so long – but without the fiscal discipline required, it is a meaningless pledge.

The manifesto has pages and pages dedicated to the NHS, but none of it addresses the core issue – that the NHS is not sustainable – and though the increased investment and attempts to improve how the NHS is run may have positive effects, it is nowhere near radical enough.

The future

We will campaign for a Conservative win in June, but for us the campaigning won’t stop there: we will carry on campaigning through the next parliament for a Conservative Party that better reflects the interests of our country and the views of many party members and activists. Help us by joining and by volunteering; we are especially looking for people who can set up CfL branches in their own areas.

If you’re as worried as we are about this manifesto and loathe to campaign for a centrist, left-leaning agenda for government, we have a list of sound candidates we really need to get into parliament to help stand up for our Conservative values – please support them.

Emily is the Chairman of Conservatives for Liberty. Follow her on Twitter: @ThinkEmily

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Harry Styles’ declaration in The Sunday Times that he will vote ‘for whoever is against Brexit’ on the basis that ‘the world should be more about being together and being better together and joining together, and I think it’s the opposite of that,’ seemed to confirm much of what I was seeing on the anti-Brexit marches which followed last year’s referendum. Vacuous, fashionable, young people who have little interest in the detail of politics, but read Buzzfeed and have vague, infantile, ideas along the lines of togetherness being nice so voting for Brexit must make you a horrid, nasty, racist. That hopey, changey, stuff again.

I should say now I am by no means tarring all Remainers, or all young people, with this brush. My flatmate is both a Remainer and a Federalist (a position I respect because it at least offers an alternative to the complete clusterfuck of the EU as it is currently constituted) and, being only three years older than Mr Styles, I suppose he still counts as young. My girlfriend is a Remainer, a Labourite, and five years younger than me – all while being eminently more sensible than I am. But, by the same token, I’d say young lefty Remainers are disproportionately represented in the ‘hopey, changey’ brigade. And this is who the Labour manifesto is aimed at.

I picked out several fantasies in Corbyn’s foreword alone (the magic comes in the accounting). ‘Young people are held back by debt’ was the first one. Really, Jez? I can only assume he’s talking about student loan repayments here, which were very consciously designed not to hold young people back. I now earn considerably more than the repayment threshold, for example, yet pay back £111 a month. So don’t be ridiculous. ‘Our entrepreneurs and managers are being held back from growing their business (sic)’ made me laugh. Jezza doesn’t seem to think hiking corporation tax and capital gains tax has any impact on business growth.

‘Britain is the fifth richest country in the world,’ he continues. ‘But that means little when many people don’t share in that wealth.’ Who, exactly, isn’t sharing in that wealth? This is a fairly prevalent misconception, as demonstrated by the lovely Cathy when she confronted the prime minister yesterday. But, to be fair to Cathy, she did have learning disabilities. Jezza’s just exploiting popular misconceptions for votes. If you look up ‘Shares of total Income Tax liability’ on Gov.UK, you can see some revealing statistics about the redistribution of wealth in this country.

The figures go back to 1999 and show, for example, that the bottom 50 per cent (and every percentile within that) have seen their share of income before tax increase in the last 16 years. Whereas, in 1999/00, the bottom 50 per cent earned 23.8 per cent of the country’s income, in 2016/17 they earned 25.3 per cent. Conversely, where in 1999/00 the top 50 per cent earned 76.2 per cent of all income, they now earn 74.7 per cent.

But the really revealing figures come from the ‘after tax’ column. There, the bottom 50 per cent’s share of earnings goes up from 25.3 per cent pre-tax to 28.3 per cent post-tax, while the top 50 per cent’s goes down from 74.7 to 71.7 per cent. Even the bottom one per cent’s earnings go from 0.3 to 0.4 per cent of all earnings, while the top one per cent’s go from 11.8 to 8.7 per cent. And, of course, the very same spreadsheet will show you that Jezza’s much-maligned five per cent – roughly those earning £80,000 a year or more – contribute almost half (47.1 per cent) of all income tax collected by HMRC. The top one per cent more than a quarter (26.9 per cent).

Many voters who know all this will vote Labour on June 8^th, because they believe it is the right thing to do, and that it offers the best set of policies to tackle the challenges this country faces. My girlfriend will likely be among them. I can respect that and I can explain why I disagree. I can even explain why I don’t think voting for Theresa May will be all that different. But what can you do with people like Harry Styles? People who like to think they Give a Toss About Stuff™ and like the sound of vague hopey, changey policies, but who aren’t old enough to remember how disastrous they were the last time they were tried and aren’t interested enough to find out? They may as well be voting Liberal Democat.

There are some consolations to this conundrum. Many of the hopey, changey brigade don’t actually think voting is all that important to the democratic process – preferring the virtue signalling of Twitter and impotent post-result marches – and time: YouGov recently found the average age people switch from voting Labour to Conservative is 34. Just another 11 years, and you’re a Tory, Harry.

Paul is Creative Editor for Conservatives for Liberty. Follow him on Twitter: @Whiggery

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Following the Prime Minister’s election announcement last Tuesday, Conservatives for Liberty have wasted no time getting into full election mode.

While we have frequently voiced concerns about some elements of Theresa May’s programme, we have consistently believed that she is the best-placed to lead the country through the process of leaving the EU, and for the next five years. And as Conservatives, we will always support Conservative and Unionist Party candidates.

We will shortly be publishing a campaign guide for our supporters which will signpost them to constituencies where they can campaign for like-minded Conservatives. A mini-manifesto which we hope will keep liberty on the agenda throughout the campaign will also be forthcoming.

What can you do now?

• Write for our blog as the election unfolds
• Sign up to our mailing list be kept up-to-date to with our campaign events
• Keep an eye on the #GE4L hashtag where we’ll be voicing our views
• Get out and campaign – elections are won on the ground, not online!

Neil Wilson is CfL Campaigns Director. Follow Neil on Twitter: @libertyneil

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As Conservative members up and down the country prepare for the second election campaign in two years, it seems to many that the result is already a foregone conclusion. A larger Tory majority is highly likely.

With things as they stand, the election is set to be fought over Brexit and will see the Lib Dems gain in many areas. With the new parliament now set to stretch well beyond the conclusion of article 50 negotiations, the new manifesto must show that the Conservatives are not just willing to campaign on successfully negotiating Brexit alone, but that Theresa May’s government is ready and willing to seize the opportunities that a global Britain presents.

Whatever result the election returns in six weeks’ time; the Prime Minister must be willing to show that it is her government that is best positioned to seize the new and exciting opportunities at hand. Although Brexit is the priority, the Party must use this new manifesto for radical thinking.

Liberalisation of planning laws is long overdue, for example. Although the recent white paper has alleviated some fears, tight restrictions over the building of houses on the green belt still mean that the construction of new homes is limited and unlikely to herald much change to the ongoing crisis in the housing sector. It is essential that more houses are built and easing planning restrictions will facilitate this.

The housing crisis, combined with the triple lock on pensions, does little to create a country that “works for everyone”, but instead rigs the country against the younger generations. Contrary to received wisdom, many young people are attracted to the Conservative Party. An ICM poll from March showed the Party ahead comfortably amongst people between the ages of 18 and 24; we have to exploit this and build upon it. The youthful, tech-savvy voters are the future and shouldn’t be neglected. Instead of securing the largely already safe votes of the over 65’s, Mrs May should look to embrace a radical manifesto to appeal to the increasingly apathetic young generations.

In her speech calling for the snap election, Mrs May referred to the House of Lords alongside arguably the buzzword of 2016: “unelected”. There are few people that will argue that the House of Lords isn’t in need of serious reform, and in the spirit of bringing democracy closer to the people, one viable option could be to see a jury style system introduced.

To many, the House of Lords is an extension of the establishment system that rewards friends with devalued peerages; a network of cronyism. Furthermore, the House of Lords has shown itself to be no friend of Brexit, and have vowed to fight the process every step of the way. According to polls, the single largest reason for Britons voting to leave the European Union last summer was for a more democratic country. If Mrs May is willing to deliver sovereignty to Britain from Brussels, then so too should the political system be brought closer to the people.

Regarding Defence policy; Mrs May would also do well to pay attention to inescapable geopolitical tensions. The armed forces of the UK are pitifully weak and in a world where the balance of power seems at its frailest since the cold war as eastern powers become more and more prominent, this matters even more. As Russia and China grow stronger and with North Korea looking nuclear, Europe appears precariously undefended. With so many of Britain’s neighbours and friends failing to meet NATO commitments, an independent Britain must look to restore its armed forces.

British troops have already been deployed to Eastern Europe to counter the ever growing threat of Russian escalation and yet an investigation by the Sunday Times earlier this year found gaping holes within UK defence. Malfunctioning drones and ships that could be heard from 100 miles away were two particularly troubling findings.

The Prime Minister has understood the desire for change; for free trade, open markets and a more workable meritocracy. Her desire to push forward the grammar schools programme demonstrates her understanding of the desire for change, so the new manifesto must not stop there.

Housing restrictions, the triple lock and reform of the House of Lords are all issues that would go towards creating a fairer country for all. The Conservative Party manifesto must reflect the real change desired by the British people and with May’s tenure now set to extend beyond Britain’s exit from the European Union, the conservatives must present themselves as the party best suited to hit the ground running and to capitalise on the new opportunities that a global Britain will present.

Brexit must bring change. June’s general election is an opportunity for Theresa May to present herself as the candidate best suited to do this.

Elliot is an English student studying in Southampton.Follow him on Twitter: @Elliott_Fudge

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The Public Administration and Consitutional Affairs Committee of the House of Commons today released a report on lessons learned from the EU referendum. Immediately, the press has seized upon a couple of paragraphs to do with cyber-security, to re-animate the old stories about the referendum being ‘hacked’.

In particular, the MPs claim that it is possible that the outage on the voter registration website was caused by a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack. They offer no evidence for the assertion. They even admit they don’t have any. Even the internal investigation into the matter concluded that the website outage was caused by an ill-anticipated spike in legitimate traffic as people rushed to register last minute. And a DDoS attack isn’t really ‘hacking’ anyway

That hasn’t stopped those who are disappointed by the democratic process from seizing on this as a means to call the result of the referendum into question. The irony is clearly lost on them, that they are so intent on showing that democracy was somehow subverted that they themselves are subverting it through tendentious reporting and misrepresenting fact.

But there is a very valid point in the HoC report. It is established beyond doubt that there was interference surrounding the US election, which could be traced back to threat groups such as APT-28, themselves linked to the Russian government. What has not been shown beyond doubt, and probably couldn’t be, is whether or not this interference had any tangible impact on the outcome.

Now misinformation is a valid concern. Evidence shows that a sizeable number of tweets during the referendum campaign were generated by accounts using ‘heavy automation’; interestingly, the proportion was approximately the same for both sides: 15.1% for Remain related hashtags, and 14.7% for Leave related hashtags, although the absolute number of pro-Brexit accounts was larger (both bot and human).

But simply because bots are used to amplify messages doesn’t mean much by itself, if one is seeking to delegitimise a result as being down to foreign interference. There are a host of other factors which have to align: the messages must be misleading; they must have had a measurable impact on the result; and they must be linked back to a foreign threat actor. None of this has been done. And again, misinformation itself isn’t ‘hacking’.

While the Home Secretary is floundering around attempting to censor the uncensorable, wasting her time and that of tech companies prattling on about necessary hashtags and attempting to prevent ISIS videos being uploaded, she should be looking to protect the nation from threats such as these. The threat of election interference is real, albeit the effectiveness is not known. And it goes far more to the heart of our democracy than rampaging extremists armed with hire cars and kitchen knives, as heinous as such attacks may be.

Handling ‘active measures’ campaigns is a complicated and delicate matter. Some information needed to combat this activity might well be derived from secret intelligence, from the security services. Other information can come from commercial players: security researchers, technology experts, etc. And social media companies themselves have a role to play, as they have access to various metrics which can be used to differentiate bot traffic from legitimate human postings.

But this must also be conducted in the open. If it is a secret operation, presided over by intelligence agencies (who do possess capabilities for both generating and countering online narratives), then there is a clear conflict of interest: what would the proper position have been for the agencies during the Brexit campaign? They are as much a branch of the civil service as any other, and therefore it would have been inappropriate to intervene on either side.

The delegitimising effect would be just as great if it was discovered that domestic intelligence services had intervened as it would if it were foreign. One need only look across the Atlantic to see the damage done to the public image of the intelligence community there as accusations and counter-accusations are thrown about, even though there is no evidence of bad faith or that the agencies did anything other than try to defend against potential threats.

Thus if the Home Secretary is to be engaging with social media companies, it should be about these matters. There is a strong public interest in understanding the nature of the threat, its extent, and to have credible reassurance that the necessary measures are in place to avert it, without compromising free expression or the level playing field of political campaigning. And above all, the defence must guided by principles of verifiable neutrality and transparency, for a clear Achilles’ heel of liberal democracies is public trust in the process, and it is weak spots such as these on which our adversaries will seek to capitalise.

Brexit wasn’t ‘hacked’. But future campaigns may well be, and it would behoove us to be prepared.

Stephen is a Policy Analyst for Conservatives for Liberty. A pragmatic minarchist and instinctual conservative, he likes free speech, free markets, and free people. Follow him on Twitter: @sp_ogrady

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