Good morning. Yesterday Kemi Badenoch published a tract setting out the principles that a Conservative government would follow in office. It was presented as Thatcherism revived for the 21st century, and a key theme was that government should leave wealth creation up to business, and not get in the way with red tape.
Today Andrew Griffith, the shadow chancellor, is presenting a plan that illustrates what this would mean in practice. Normally, at party conference, ministers and shadow ministers put out a press release in advance of their speeches highlighting just one headline policy idea, with perhaps one or two associated policies.
Overnight Griffith has published what is practically a manifesto. The press release alone runs to almost 5,000 words. Jessica Elgot had the task of reading them all for us yesterday and here is her write-up.
Read moreShe has led her story on the plan to get rid of two environment quangos, the Environment Agency and Natural England.
But there are plenty of other proposals in the package too, including:
-Getting rid of net zero regulations and other planning laws, including section 106 agreements and the community infrastructure levy, that put up the cost of housebuilding.
-Getting rid of the EPR (extended producer responsibility), a law intended to make producers liable for waste disposal costs. The Tories call it the “grocery tax”.
-Backing a third runway at Heathrow.
-Leaving the Aarhus convention, an international treaty giving the public access to information relating to environmental decision-making. The Tories claim this enables the “lawfare hindering every major infrastructure project in this country”.
-Speeding up the delivery of more nuclear power stations.
The Tories claim the plans relating to housebuilding would “cut up to an estimated £50,000 off the price of a new home”.
There is more detail in what Griffith is proposing, and there is clearly a lot to discuss. Labour and Reform UK have both responded overnight – but taking different lines of attack.
Labour has said that Griffith has no credibility on these topics. In an overnight statement, Bridget Phillipson, the party chair, said:
double quotation markTrusting the co-author of Liz Truss’ disastrous mini-Budget with Tory plans on the economy and housing is like asking an arsonist to run the fire service. Kemi Badenoch is once again demonstrating her appalling lack of judgement.
The Tories had 14 years in government to grow our economy and help people get on the housing ladder, but they completely failed at every turn.
But Richard Tice, the Reform UK deputy leader and business spokesperson, says that Griffith is copying ideas that his party has already adopted. He says:
double quotation markTories pledge to scrap some costs regulations and taxes they put in place!
They are copying Reform policies we announced weeks and months ago!
One of the themes emerging at this conference is that, while there is far less talk of some sort of Tory/Reform UK pact than there was a year ago, the policy overlap continues. Yesterday the Conservatives announced two other proposals (excluding foreigners from the student loan scheme, and reducing aid spending to just £1bn a year) that were little more than cut-and-paste versions of Reform UK pledges.
9.45am: Andrew Bowie, the shadow energy secretary, speaks at the conference on the main stage (the smaller of the two halls the Tories are using at this conference for speeches). The other main morning speakers are Richard Holden, the shadow transport secretary, at 10.30am; Damian Hinds, the shadow health secretary, at 11.15am; and Andrew Griffith, the shadow chancellor, Helen Whately, the shadow work and pensions secretary, and Laura Trott, after 12.15pm.
12.14pm: Victoria Atkins, the shadow environment secretary, speaking in the fanzone area on the Conservative’s rural vision.
2pm: Griffith takes part in “meet the team” event in the symphony hall (the conference stage being used for larger events) with Richard Fuller, chief secretary to the Treasury, Katie Lam, the shadow housing secretary, and Julia Lopez, the acting shadow business secretary.
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