[Update: Oh dear, I wrote this and now have to retract it… Cameron did say this but look at this]
Cameron today said:
Everything we do will be guided by two core values: trusting people, and sharing responsibility.
- We believe that the more you trust people, the more power and responsibility you give them, the stronger they and society become.
- We believe that we’re all in this together — individuals, families, government, business, voluntary organisations. We have a shared responsibility for our shared future.
- Trusting people, and sharing responsibility: these are the values we need to meet the challenges of the modern world.
- They are different from Labour’s approach, which is to tell people what to do and to assume that everything is the state’s responsibility.
This should put to rest all those concerns people have been having once and for all.
January 9th, 2006 at 6:38 pm
Hmmm.
Cameron said:
“They are different from Labour’s approach, which is to tell people what to do and to assume that everything is the state’s responsibility.”
New Conservative education policy: They are different from Labour’s approach, which is to tell people what to do and to assume that everything is the state’s responsibility.
Is that not telling people what to do? Not trusting professionals? And assuming this is the state’s responsibility?
Cameron said:
“We believe that the more you trust people, the more power and responsibility you give them, the stronger they and society become.”
This woukld be why David Willetts today said that “market forces and parental choice are not enough to drive up standards”, would it? Surely that’s an admissions that parents cannot be trusted to drive the educational process and that teachers are incapable of responding to demands placed on them?
Fine words butter no parsnips, etc.
January 9th, 2006 at 7:15 pm
I can’t find that quote on the internet, but I am sure there was a reason for “the Brain” to say it…
Maybe he was trying to ensure that the Tories do not, yet again, get labelled as the party that would help the rich while sticking it to the poor (which they never have been, but it’s a great stick to prod with).
January 9th, 2006 at 7:19 pm
Okay, I found the article on your website - apologies…
Yes, the commentary is disgusting and false-logic. Setting is not the only answer and Ministerial governance is absolutely not the way to go about it either…
What’s wrong with these people - I’m adding this to the Cameron Leadership now!
January 9th, 2006 at 7:25 pm
“I can’t find that quote on the internet”
Try The Times.
“Maybe he was trying to ensure that the Tories do not, yet again, get labelled as the party that would help the rich while sticking it to the poor”
Hmmm. The person who breathes life into that accusation is David Cameron when he repeatedly asserts that he wantsbetter services for all and not an escape route for the few - the implication being that this was just the aim of the party he’s changing.
January 9th, 2006 at 7:32 pm
I think Cameron’s strategy is to simply remove all the “negatives” that people associate with the Conservatives. The great problem is that these seem to be the “negatives” as seen by Polly Toynbee or Yasmin Alibhai-Brown!
As such, Cameron rubbishes old policies and free market ideas to demonstrate how much the party’s changed under his leadership. Unlike Bruce Anderson, I don’t think Cameron’s subsequently going to move to the right.
It’s all quite reminiscent of Canadian Progressive Conservatives. That party surrendered to all the Liberal’s party’s social and cultural arguments in the early 80’s, and brought in a young telegenic leader who won a couple of elections before being cut down to two MP’s in the early 1990s when the Reform Party emerged on the right and the recession removed the only reason for anyone to vote for the PCs.
January 9th, 2006 at 7:39 pm
That’s promising, though, in two ways: First a genuinely libertarian party may be the result of this and, in the meantime, we will have a Conservative party that, while it doesn’t do what we want, doesn’t do as much harm as Labour would have…
Of course I stand by my rant on the Cameron Leadership Blog.
January 9th, 2006 at 8:10 pm
Of course, there’s one key difference: I don’t think Cameron’s tactics can deliver an overall majority. Sooner or later right wing voters will be disillusioned and either not vote or switch to fringe parties. He may not be able to win with us alone, but he can never win without us.
Consider this, he’s a month into his leadership and the right wing press (Telegraph, Times, Mail, Business, Scotsman, Spectator) have all started criticising him, and Polly Toynbee likes him. That ‘ain’t right!
January 9th, 2006 at 8:27 pm
He won’t get enough of the socialist and LibDem vote and he may not get a large chunk of the Tory vote… It would be interesting, but I don’t think that will happen. He’s not haemorraging votes like that for two reasons:
1) People on the Right don’t believe him (and bloggers are not representative)
2) Many on the Right will vote for the Tories regardless of whether they are advocating public flogging and the poll tax