The choice at the next election will be on the economy, says Julia Lopez
Acting Shadow Business Secretary Julia Lopez has said the Conservatives must not deviate from their economic policy positions to try to win back Reform voters.
Speaking on GB News, she said: “We’re very pleased to see these polling numbers, but there’s absolutely no room for complacency. It remains a very challenging political outlook. We’ve got a lot of trust that we still need to rebuild with the electorate.
“But Kemi is doing a very good job. It’s a very strong team that she is building. She’s doing it patiently, she’s thinking about the issues that most resonate with voters.
“One of the interesting things about the recent polling was that there was an uptick in the number of younger voters who were coming to us, which is really, really reassuring.
“So we’ve got clear policies on things like stamp duty, on student loans, on other tax policies for businesses that are feeling such pressure.
“The most interesting thing in the budget for me last week was looking at the OBR report on real household disposable income. That is going to be squeezed so considerably in the course of the coming years.
“That’s a massive problem for Labour, and people are looking for a party that understands how to grow the economy and how to deal with some of those cost of living pressures and I think that Labour is still not fundamentally dealing with that.
“It was a budget of small things which is only going to be effectively shifting money from different places.
“I think Kemi made that very clear distinction between people who have been voting Reform and Reform the party. We want those voters back.
“What we must not do in looking at that polling is think that we can change any of our positions when it comes to economic management, when it comes to hard immigration policy; those are the things that those voters want to see.
“They’re very worried about the state of the country. They’re business people who are worried about how much their businesses are being squeezed. They are tradesmen, they are people that are worried about border control, and we need to show them that we have a very solid platform on that front.
“I would say, Jacob, you and I were in that appalling ’17 to ’19 Parliament where there was a real fracturing of party politics. There were new parties popping up here, there and everywhere.
“But when there was a very clear choice at the election, people consolidated around the two major parties. I’m not saying that’s definitely going to happen again, but I think there will be a clear choice in the next election, and it will be on the economy.”
