Adam Stokes

So, @danny__kruger has written a long thread explaining why the Tories have lost their soul. I have read it. It is not a political philosophy. It is a resignation letter from a man who did not get the job he wanted. Danny, let me be blunt. I am surprised you were ever a genuine, committed, ideological Conservative. You sound like one of those left-wing humanities students chanting "tax the rich" - basically Zarah Sultana, just a more refined version. There is barely a conservative bone in your argument. Your tax argument starts from the wrong end. Taxation is the state taking people's money by force. The state must justify taking it. Families do not have to justify keeping it. You treat a tax cut as suspect because its recipients have money. That is left-wing nonsense. That is not a conservative principle. A family home is not a bank account. Yes, technically, many family homes that will won’t be taxed when passed as inheritance will be in London and South East. But that’s simply because those house prices are astronomical. Families spend decades servicing massive mortgages out of taxed earnings, often cleared out by those payments. They are born in these communities. They work. They get by. They have no choice but to live in houses this expensive. Many won’t have savings due to the size of mortgage repayments. I know - it is my predicament too. My mortgage is clearing me out monthly. But if I pay it off, that is my bloody wealth. It is not income. It is not spare cash. Removing inheritance tax from a family home does not increase the bill for someone whose home is already exempt. Fair taxation is not a competition to make every household equally miserable. An unfair tax does not become fair because another family already escapes it. The conservative question is whether the state needs this money and can justify taking it. Your question is whether the people keeping it are sufficiently poor. That is class war. How are you different from @bphillipsonMP? Then there is the childcare cliff. Cross £100k and lose thousands in support. A pay rise leaves a parent worse off. People hold down their earnings to avoid it. That is a broken incentive. Fixing it is pro-work and pro-family. That is a conservative principle. You claim these tax announcements came before any offer to ordinary households. That is more nonsense. The Conservatives announced electricity bill cuts, expanded apprenticeships, and the £5,000 First Job Bonus in 2025 - a full year before this inheritance tax announcement. You deleted that history to manufacture your grievance. Read the full programme. 100,000 additional apprenticeships. £5,000 of employee National Insurance redirected into savings for a first job. Halving employer National Insurance for workers aged 21 to 24. Young people are in the programme. You are picking on wealthy beneficiaries and presenting your outrage as if it is the entire Conservative offer. And so on. You know, many Conservatives have told each other in private that you would be one of the few defections genuinely missed. After this thread, I think we will be just fine.