We must look forward not pine for yesteryear, says minister

Progressive: Greg Barker
12 April 2012

Conservative modernisers need to "wake up" to defend David Cameron's mission of change and optimism - and prevent the Tory Right and Liberal Democrats from dominating the political agenda, a minister warned today.

Greg Barker, minister at the Department of Energy and Climate Change, issued a call to arms to Tory progressives to speak up for "the future not the past" and said the party risks "lurching" back into its comfort zone if it fails to drum up new ideas to reform Britain.

In what will be seen as a attack on the Tory old guard, the MP for Bexhill and Battle appealed to the party to renew its vision to meet the "goals and aspirations of families today rather than families in the Fifties" and not "pine for some yesteryear".

Tory Right-wingers have been on the march with calls for a referendum on Britain's membership of the EU and to axe the 50p top rate of tax.

Mr Barker also firmly rejected calls for the Government to sideline the green agenda and localism as it focuses on tackling Britain's debt mountain.

"It's time for the modernisers to wake up and speak up for the mission that the Prime Minister began in 2005," he said in an interview with the Evening Standard. "That mission is for people who are comfortable with Britain in the 21st century, who are not looking back to some golden age, who don't pine for some yesteryear but have a vision of where we can take the country that is firmly rooted in 21st-century Britain and the goals and aspirations of families today.

"The central messages of change, hope and optimism which were the hallmarks of the Cameron campaign remain just as valid today but require a lot more thought and explanation in such a difficult economic climate."

Having recently returned from global warming talks in Washington, he says the modern Conservative party is a "million miles" from the Republican Party of Sarah Palin and the Tea Party activists. Warning of the "danger" that the PM only ever hears his critics, Mr Barker adds: "The big problem is to date there has been too much emphasis on certain ideas from the Right and the Liberal Democrats on the Left, ignoring the ballast in amongst the progressive modernisers. We have got to make sure his supporters get equal airtime."

Mr Barker, 45, is co-founding a new Conservative 2020 group, understood to have been encouraged by Mr Cameron and George Osborne, the Chancellor.

Among the 40 or so MPs who have already expressed an interest in joining are Overseas Secretary Andrew Mitchell, key Cameroonian Hugo Swire, Claire Perry, Margot James, Helen Grant and Justine Greening.

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