Published in the FT, Satuday 30th September 2011
Baroness Warsi
A BIGGER SAY ON POLICY FOR CONSERVATIVE MEMBERS
As a Party, we’ve got to keep listening to our volunteers and give them a bigger role in the political process. Thanks to our new, revitalised Conservative Policy Forum, we’ve now given the grassroots a much stronger voice on policy and we’re going to make sure that voice is listened to and really counts. There’s a huge amount of passion, expertise and thinking going on in our grassroots – after all, most people become party members because they want to voice their views. So I want us to harness that thinking as we look ahead to the big policy challenges of 2015 and beyond.
KEEP REACHING OUT TO BME COMMUNITES AND BROADEN OUR APPEAL
Over the last five years we’ve made big progress changing our party to make it better represent our country. So as well as getting the first Muslim in Cabinet, we’ve tripled the number of Conservative women MPs and more than tripled the number of BME Conservative MPs. But the blunt truth is we’ve still got masses more to do.
There are still whole communities and areas where our support isn’t what it should be. Fixing this has to be a top priority. Look at these communities and you see so many people who could be Conservatives. After all, our values have been their values for years: hard work, responsibility, self-discipline, respect for your elders, support for the family. We’ve got to reach out and bring them in to their natural home – our modern, compassionate Conservative Party.
REAFFIRM OUR COMMITMENT TO THE NHS
One of the truly great things about our country is that we have a health service that is free at the point of use and available to everyone. It means no matter who you are, where you live, or how much money you have, there will always be help when you most need. It’s says a huge amount about our values as a country – and I want David Cameron to stand by our commitment to protect the NHS. I was proud that he made the NHS such a strong, personal priority five years ago and we’ve got to continue that over the next four years. Crucially, that means doing two key things: keep increasing spending on the NHS and make sure it is protected; put patients at the heart of the NHS, with more choice and better value for money.
BE ON THE SIDE OF HARD-WORKING PEOPLE
By far the biggest challenge we face as a government is to fix the feeling that too often life in Britain isn’t fair – that in this country, you don’t get out what you put in. For years it’s been growing and it’s been driven by different things – the something for nothing culture; seeing some people live off benefits without ever working hard for a living; the ridiculous benefit rules punishing people who want to get back into work or encouraging couples to live separately. This is all wrong and I want the Prime Minister to keep showing courage to fix it. It’s a massive task and it means applying a few simple tests in everything: are we encouraging responsibility? Are people getting what they deserve? And as a government, are we backing people who do the right thing?
STICK TO THE COURSE ON THE ECONOMY
Over the next year there will be plenty of people telling the Prime Minister to change economic course or slow down our deficit reduction plan – not least our opponents in the Labour Party, who have now opposed every single policy we’ve put forward to cut spending. But it is absolutely vital we stick a course which the markets, the rating agencies, the OECD, the IMF and the EU have all said is the right one. This is fundamental to our economic future. While other countries have lacked the political will to take action, the coalition in Britain – despite being two very different political parties – have shown leadership and courage to start the hard work of balancing the books. We still have a deficit bigger than Spain, Italy and Portugal, and if we deviate from our path, we could face the same kind of sovereign debt problems those countries have been facing. We need to stick to our course over the coming year.
Published in The Evening Standard, Friday 30th September 2011
By Joe Murphy, Political Editor
As the Tories gather in Manchester tomorrow, Sayeeda Warsi will be reading children’s stories.
More specifically, she will be creating audio books for visually impaired children and bullying her Cabinet colleagues, including David Cameron, to do the same.
“It only takes 15 minutes and for some young kids it’s their only access to stories,” she bubbles in her broad Yorkshire accent.
The audiobook idea is the latest in a string of social action projects under her chairmanship. The party has even produced an app so people can record a story themselves and email it over. “It’s a world first and after the conference we are going to donate the app to charity,” she enthuses, talking 19 to the dozen.
“I’ve told the whole Cabinet to read a book. I don’t know what stories we will read yet. I’m obsessed with social action projects. This charity needs more volunteers and we have 11,000 people coming to our conference.”
There is plenty that is new and refreshing about Baroness Warsi, 40, the first Muslim woman to sit in Cabinet. The daughter of an immigrant Dewsbury mill worker who made a fortune by launching a bed making company, she is a Tory moderniser, yet, like many Asian women, also profoundly traditional in her values.
“Somebody asked me, ‘Have you ever taken illegal drugs?’ and I went, ‘I don’t even smoke, I don’t drink, I don’t take drugs. I’m probably the most boring person you can find.’”
From her glass-walled office in Conservative Campaign HQ, where she sips elderflower cordial, she runs an infamous election machine that, as she proudly recalls, won hands down the AV referendum last May. She will do “whatever it takes” to give Boris Johnson a second term as Mayor next year and says the thought of losing to Ken Livingstone in the Olympic and Jubilee year “makes my stomach turn”.
This year’s Tory conference, she reveals, will boast “cutting edge” innovations, like an “app” for downloading speeches and videos; a Dragons’ Den-style business competition; and something called “an interactive wall”.
But there will also be a return to traditional debates. “For the first time in years we are going to have a good old-fashioned open party debate on policy. I want to move away from three people on white bucket chairs.”
The slogan, she revealed, will be Leadership For A Better Future, a theme that acknowledges the tough times but holds out the promise that austerity measures will prove worthwhile.
“My parents said to me the only way to improve yourself and avoid working double shifts like my dad was to work damned hard and pass every exam along the way, not sit in front of the TV.
“My mum used to say, ‘as you sow, so you shall reap’. Actually, she gave us the Asian version, but it’s absolutely true.”
She says her friends are all belt-tightening, buying frozen foods and considering second-hand school uniforms. “These are decisions every family is making. It would be so easy for us to get the [Government’s] chequebook out and not make the tough calls. But ask people if they would prefer to have it easy now or, by taking tough decisions, create a better future for their children, most will instinctively choose to put their children first.”
She accused Ed Miliband of “hypocrisy” for attacking a something-for-nothing society while opposing government reforms like axing legal aid for squatters. “They come in, take something for nothing, abuse fair play, but Labour wants the state to pay them.”
She claimed the Tories are already creating a something-for-something society. “It’s about making sure that it pays you to come off benefits into work, that’s the culture we are creating. Labour are talking this great talk but opposing us.”
Baroness Warsi is kinder to the Lib Dems and predicts that Tories will be focused more on winning the next general election outright than “trashing” their partners in coalition.
She does flatly rule out any form of election pact with Nick Clegg‘s party. “Absolutely. I’m chairman of the Conservative Party and I am doing all I can to make sure we say to the country, ‘give us an outright Conservative majority.’”
Setting a fine example of non-aggression in the meantime, she makes a joke out of Chris Huhne‘s comment which compared her conduct of the AV campaign to that of Nazi propagandist Dr Goebbels.
“When I was young my mum wanted me to be a doctor and I never lived up to her expectations [Warsi became a lawyer]. What I always say is, the Conservatives might have made me a Lady but it took the Liberal Democrats to make me a doctor.”
The Daily Star Sunday, Sunday 18th September 2011
These strikes are a slap in the face to hard working people in Britain.
At a time when we are working flat out to bring Labour’s reckless spending under control, these walkouts will bring disruption and damage to our economy.
I wonder if these union leaders – with their huge pay packets – have thought about the effect they will have on hard working people in our country?
All across Britain, families are tightening their belts as the world faces some incredibly tough economic times. These are the people who will suffer the consequences of this strike action.
Of course, we massively value the work of our public sector. They teach our children, run our hospitals and deliver our emergency services. They are vital to our country.
That’s why we’re proposing a fair deal on public sector pensions. It’s a good deal for people who work in the public sector and a good deal for taxpayers as well.
The terms proposed are still great pension schemes for the public sector. What the Government is doing is asking people to pay a bit more towards them and work a little longer in order to make them sustainable.
It’s the sheer unfairness of what the Union Barons are proposing that gets me.
For years, Star readers who work in business and private sector companies have seen the gap between them and their public sector colleagues get worse.
In the public sector, pensions were protected while people in the private sector saw their pensions cut and faced tough redundancies.
The point is we need to act in the national interest, not for factional interests, and the Labour Party have to be responsible here.
If they’re serious, Ed Miliband and Ed Balls must stand up to their union paymasters – who give Labour 85 per cent of their cash – and work with us to bring them back to the negotiating table. This is about the national interest – not factional interests.
This Government stands firmly behind hard working people in this country in the public and private sector. These strikes are bad for business, bad for the economy and bad for Britain.
Union bosses must rethink this reckless decision that will damage jobs and achieve nothing.
