How the Conservative Party jettisoned its fundamental beliefs

SIR – For many years, a Conservative majority has not resulted in Conservative governments.

Successive Conservative and Labour prime ministers, from John Major to the present incumbent, could have sat happily in each other’s Cabinets. With a couple of exceptions, no one in Boris Johnson’s Cabinet would have earned a place in Margaret Thatcher’s.

Consensus policies of state intervention, high taxation and wasteful public spending have characterised the last 30 years. Conservative values – a small state, low taxes, individual freedom and enterprise – have been honoured in the breach rather than the observance.

Now that Brexit has happened, we need a centre-Right government that will seize the opportunities to trade freely, and encourage private enterprise to stimulate the economic growth required to repair the social, economic and mental damage inflicted by repeated lockdowns. MPs have been sidelined as ministers govern by decree. Voters backed Tory candidates not just because of Brexit, but also in the belief that they represented a love of freedom, and limited state control. Their good faith must be repaid.

David Saunders Sidmouth, Devon

SIR – As the archetypal small businessman and entrepreneur – home owner, self-employed and with a single additional property to rent – I ought to be the very definition of a Conservative voter.

However, in the past 11 years of Tory rule, I cannot think of a single policy implemented by any Chancellor that has been of encouragement to me, never mind benefit.

David Jepson Darley Abbey, Derbyshire

SIR – If you assume that about 30 million people work in the UK, then the number now paying the 40 per cent tax rate is staggering – from one in 15 (two million) in the early Nineties to one in six (five million) in the next couple of years. It’s actually worse than that because the population was smaller then.

These are not the really wealthy – just those aspiring to a better life in good, middle-of-the road jobs. With another 5 per cent rise in council tax, once again Middle England is being punished for years of government overspending.

Mike Metcalfe Glastonbury, Somerset

SIR – Claims that businesses will leave the UK because of future increases in the rate of corporation tax are wide of the mark. Likewise, corporate tax incentives, such as super-deductions for investments in plant and machinery, will have little impact.

Thirty-five years of working in the tax world convinced me that few business leaders have much understanding of tax. They prefer to be measured on pre-tax profits. Business decisions are made for many reasons, but corporate tax is rarely one of them.

Christopher Dent Hadlow, Kent