Theresa May pitches to the centre ground in first party conference speech

The Prime Minister pitched to the centre ground in her conference speech on Wednesday, as she rebranded the Conservatives the party for the working class.

May said Britain voting to leave the European Union in June’s referendum said something broader than merely about membership of the trading block, but a protest vote against an economic policy fixed to work for the privileged few.

“Our society should work for everyone but if you can’t afford to get on the property ladder or if your child is stuck in a bad school it doesn’t feel like it’s working for you.”

The prime minister said the Labour party was too divided to make the country work and did not have a monopoly on compassion.

“Let’s have no more of Labour’s absurd belief that they have a monopoly on compassion. Let’s put an end to their sanctimonious pretence of moral superiority. Let’s make clear that they have given up the right to call themselves the party of the NHS, the party of the workers, the party of public servants.”

May said she wanted to build a new “united Britain rooted in the centre ground” where everyone plays by the same rules as she indicated a curb on working conditions, corporate responsibility and tax avoidance.

“If you are a boss who earns a fortune but doesn’t look after your staff, an international company that treats tax laws as an optional extra…a director that takes out massive dividends while knowing that a company pension is about to go bust…I am putting you on warning. A change has got to come and this party is going to make it.”

She said the Conservatives believe in free markets but she said if markets are dysfunctional, the government should be prepared to intervene.

“Where companies are exploiting the failures of the market in which they operate, where consumer choice is inhibited by deliberately complex pricing structures, we must set the market right.

“It's just not right, for example, that half of the people living in rural areas, and so many small business, can’t get a decent broadband connection. It’s just not right that two thirds of energy customers are stuck on the most expensive tariffs. And it’s just not right that the housing market continues to fail people wither.”

She repeated that Article 50, the clause which starts two-year divorce proceedings with the EU, till the end of March 2017 but said it was too early to see what an agreement would look like.

Business leaders are no ‘pantomime villains’

Carolyn Fairbairn, Director-General of the Confederation of British Industry, said in response to the speech that government action can help make May’s vision a reality and must be developed hand-in-hand with industry.

Fairburn added: “Government must build on the great things so many firms are already doing and not impose approaches that look good on paper, but don’t make a difference in practice. Placing workers or consumers on boards can be a solution for some firms, but may not be the only or even best way of changing company culture.”

James Sproule, the Institute of Directors’ director of policy said he welcomed the May’s focus on how corporate leadership can aid economic and social success.

However, Sproule maintained “business leaders are not pantomime villains” who evade taxes and employ cheap labour from abroad “out of some destructive desire to do Britain down”.

“For every Mike Ashley or Philip Green there are hundreds of thousands of hard-working entrepreneurs who are more likely to re-mortgage their homes than own a super yacht. Those people will now be watching the autumn statement and the chancellor like a hawk, expecting more measures to promote enterprise and investment than we saw in this speech.”

Pat McFadden, the Labour MP and an Open Britain spokesman, said the centrist language May used in her speech could not cover up the direction towards hard Brexit which had been signalled this week.

“She praised a series of sectors and firms all of whom have warned her about the dangers of leaving the European single market and customs union. There is no point in talking up industrial strategy when your central economic direction threatens industry’s capacity to export freely to its biggest market.”

This was echoed by Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron, who said the Conservatives had moved to the right despite May’s centrist rhetoric as they were “utterly divorced” from the party’s actions over the last few days.

“Our NHS needs a new deal to secure its future and yet we heard nothing, and the chancellor shelved George Osborne’s confused and damaging spending plans but has left us nothing but a blank sheet of paper. I was surprised though that the prime minister did not take the time to thank the one person who helped create her agenda: not David Cameron, but Nigel Farage.”