Over the coming weeks, CapX will be running a number of perspectives on the future of the Conservative Party. If you have an idea you would like to contribute, get in touch at [email protected].
On 5 July, I was elected as MP for my home constituency of Leicester East. ‘Conservative gain’ wasn’t a term we heard enough that night. We should have been toasting Conservative gains and holds up and down the country.
Instead, we let internal squabbles and distractions overshadow the incredible things that successive Conservative governments have done for our country.
I know that we can rebuild. As I said earlier this week, I’ve got bags of optimism for us as a party if we can just get our act together. Having seen James Cleverly in Leicester at the weekend, I know that he is the person to lead. No fuss, no drama. He just gets on with the job.
I watched him engage with businesses and local communities. He just gets it. He is on their side and he knows how to articulate a positive vision for them. As he has said, we have become the grumpy party. We need to change that and set out our positive stall in order to win back those voters that we lost to Labour, the Liberal Democrats, Reform – and those who simply didn’t come out to vote.
James also has a vision for our party that will win over young voters. One of my priorities is to make sure that young people have real reasons to vote Conservative. We must make sure that they have opportunities, whoever they are and wherever they come from. Let’s help them get the best education, own a home, and start their own businesses.
I am hugely encouraged by what James has said so far. He has a plan to show young people that capitalism and economic growth are what will drive opportunity for them. A lot of young people don’t feel that capitalism is working for them. We need to give them a stake in our society and in our growing economy.
James gets that we need to sell our values again, of family, home ownership, free markets, lower taxes and less red tape. He wants to show young people that free markets, not planned economies, are their friend, and will help them get on the housing ladder and start their own businesses. He is absolutely right to make this a defining mission of our party, and policies like abolishing stamp duty on homes altogether are exactly the sort of thing we need to be going after.
We also need to make sure that we have the supply of houses that we need in the first place; simple changes like a presumption of planning consent for adding an extra storey to a building would make a huge difference. Not to mention, it would support local building firms and local economies.
Ultimately, growth comes from less red tape, lower taxes and dynamic leadership. Look at what Ben Houchen has done in the Tees Valley – Conservative solutions leading to thousands of jobs being created and an enormous boost to the economy.
That’s exactly what I think we should replicate around the country. It shouldn’t be the case that young people have to move away to find the best jobs or the best educational opportunities. Opportunity should exist everywhere.
I have a business background myself, and it is under Conservative governments that I was able to achieve so much. It pains me that the successes of our party were overshadowed by the behaviour of politicians in Westminster. We have to change our behaviour so that we can start to focus on what really matters; putting in place Conservative solutions to the challenges of the day.
I am so excited to be part of this rebuild, and I know that with James as our leader we can turn around our fortunes and be the party of hope and aspiration once again.
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