Using Our Progressive Past To Guide Our Progressive Future

I’m delighted that the progressive history of the Tory Party now been recognised with a new ‘History’ section on the Conservatives website and a very nicely put together video. At last we have official recognition that the Conservative Party did not, as some people seem to believe, just open its doors for business in 1975.    Rather, the Conservative Party has a proud and distinguished progressive history and heritage.

If anything, I fear that we have been a little too sheepish.  We should shouting our progressive heritage from the rooftops.

I became interested and involved in politics because I wanted to help ensure that we had a society that was fairer that tackled extremes of poverty and hopelessness; a society in which the accident of birth did not determine a child’s life chances; a society in which talent opened a door to opportunity for all; and in which the state provided both a safety net and a helping hand.  It was the progressive past of the Conservative Party, as well as our progressive present that attracted me to the Party.  We need to be braver in making clear to everybody that we have a proud progressive tradition in the Conservative Party.

We are a Party that, in the words of a trade union leader about Disraeli’s great reforming Government had “done more for the working class in five years than the Liberals did in fifty.”

We are a Party that did so much, often in the teeth of bitter opposition, to improve the conditions of working men and women; to alleviate poverty; to enhance the natural environment; and to spread opportunity.  We are the Party responsible for wide ranging social reform; laying the foundations of the welfare state; maintaining the NHS; and spreading opportunity throughout society.

Disraeli proclaimed that the great mission of the Conservative Party was to “elevate the condition of the people”.    We have taken on that challenge ever since.

This progressive tradition goes beyond the surface of the Conservatives.com page.  The golden thread starts with Disraeli, who called himself a “radical to change all that is wrong with the constitution.”  It continues through numerous other Tory figures, who have ensured that progressive Conservatism has remianed the dominant strain in Conservative thought for the past century and a half.

• Randolph Churchill, with his plea to “trust the people” and vision of ‘Tory Democracy’ and radical social reform.

• Joseph Chamberlain, with his extensive social reforms.  Chamberlain, who echoing the words of Disraeli said that, “the great problem of our civilization is still unsolved. We have to account for and grapple with the mass of misery and destitution in our midst, co-existent as it is with the evidence of abundant wealth and teeming prosperity… Our object is the elevation of the poor, of the masses of the people.”

• Winston Churchill and his strongly held and unwavering progressivism – beginning with his radicalism in the early 20^th Century and continuing, through his battle against tyranny, through to his Government that strengthened the welfare state in the early 1950s.

• Macmillan, with his ‘middle way’, record house building and Government that boasted high GDP, low unemployment and accelerating standards of living.

• Iain Macleod, who ensured that the Conservative Party remained the Party of compassion and tolerance.  He was right when he told fellow Conservatives that there is no point in telling people to stand on their own two feet if you have removed the ground from beneath them.

• Michael Heseltine and the regeneration of numerous inner cities.

This golden thread runs through Margaret Thatcher’s extension of share ownership and home ownership to all people.  It runs all the way through to David Cameron and today’s progressive Conservatives, with our emphasis on decentralising power; tackling poverty; and improving education in the most deprived areas.  Conservative means for progressive ends.

Let it never be said that by calling ourselves ‘progressive’ we are somehow not being Conservatives.  Instead, by calling ourselves progressive Conservatives, we are drawing on the dominant Tory tradition.

Related posts:

1. Labour’s Progressive Wing Is Stuck In The Past
2. What have you been doing for the past 11 years, Mr Prescott?
3. Alice Mahon Is Right – Labour Is No Longer A Progressive Party
4. Don’t panic, Polly – progressive Conservatism is alive and kicking
5. Building An Enduring Progressive Conservative Electoral Coalition