Tories Still Modernising Francis Maud Insists.

As the Tory party moves heaven and earth to force the country back into the mid-19th century, encouraging slum landlords, recreating workhouses for the poor and freeing capitalism to be as nasty and brutish as it can be, Francis Maud is insisting that the Tory party is still "modernising" itself. "Any party that ceases to modernise is a party that is going backwards," he told the Guardian today. "Modernisation is not something about realigning the Conservative party's principles," he added, "it is simply about making it current and making it contemporary." All of which begs the question, "Yes, and your point?" Meanwhile Cameron is hoping that a tax break for married couples, 66% of whom won't even qualify for it, will swing the election for him, Ian Duncan Smith is now talking about himself as the new William Beveridge even as he callously throws the poor, vulnerable and sick to the wolves and Michael Gove is hoping to recreate a two-tier education system in which only the children of the wealthy will benefit. If such 19th century thinking is what the Tories consider to be modern then one can only presume that they are still stuck in the 18th. But, if you really want to know what "modern" Toryism is all about then you have to look no further than Eric Pickles. Confronted by one of his own constituents who was abused as a child at the Kendall House care home and wanted to know why he and his party were ignoring the allegations, his reaction was to tell her to "adjust her medication." That is modern Toryism in a nutshell - callous, uncaring, selfish, self-serving and brutishly primitive.