Care for your voters

HAS the Tory party abandoned one of its fundamental values? For countless middleclass parents, making sacrifices to pay off the mortgage so their home can pass to their children on their deaths is a central tenet of Conservatism.

But according to care minister Jackie Doyle-Price, they shouldn’t regard their properties as ‘ an asset to give to their offspring’, but something to be milked for care fees.

Have ministers learnt nothing from the election debacle, when they let Labour paint their care policy as a ‘dementia tax’?

Even though she was swiftly disowned by No10, Miss Doyle-Price’s words allowed Jeremy Corbyn to pose as a defender of the family home – when of course homeowners would end up paying Labour’s tax bills.

Yes, Britain’s social care system is desperately short of funds, the result of post-war governments of every colour putting National Insurance money into the Treasury pot. And yes, fixing it may well require the better off to contribute more to the costs of their own care.

But if the Tories think the answer is to declare war on their core supporters – and crush the aspirations of millions of middleclass Britons – they have truly lost their marbles.

YESTERDAY Stephen Glover described in this paper how in 2014 the BBC deceived its readers by pouring scorn on reports there would be a flood of migrants from Romania and Bulgaria. So the ONS report showing more than 400,000 from these countries now live in the UK was the perfect chance to set the record straight. Yet for all our efforts, the Mail can find no record of the report on BBC news bulletins or its vast website. What a surprise!