‘Aspiration is value that defines Tory party best’
LEE Anderson has called for the Tories to get back to their “core values” such as “aspiration”, in order to win the next election.
The Conservative vice chairman also called Britain a “gift to the world” at the National Conservatism Conference in London yesterday.
The former coal miner said: “I’m so proud to be British and the realignment we speak about is not that difficult, it’s about getting back to our core values.
“The one common thread that runs through the party – I don’t always agree with my colleagues and they certainly don’t agree with me – but the one common thread we’ve got is aspiration.”
He continued: “It’s about providing opportunity and a society where anybody in this country can get on.
Powerful
“That sounds a bit like the American dream but I tell you, it’s the British dream.”
The MP for Ashfield said the Tories were the “only party” that would have taken him from “the roughest street” of his town to become its deputy chairman.
But he said it was Boris Johnson, Brexit and Jeremy Corbyn who helped the Tories win the Red Wall in 2019, adding: “It was nothing to do with some of my colleagues, who think it’s all about them.”
He also told of how he forgave ex-PM Margaret Thatcher when a local man told him about how her policy changed his life.
The man, also a miner, became a Tory when tenants were given the right to buy their council homes at a discounted price.
This “powerful” conversation made Labour councillor Mr Anderson switch to the Tories in 2018 after three years as a Labour councillor.