Old-Fashioned Tribalism: Public Opinion of Political Parties.

It seems to me there is a great disconnect with what people think UK political parties stand for (based on historical predjudices) and what they actually stand for today.

For instance the Tories are thought of by the public as Toffs, for the rich: a low-tax, low-spending party. A party of less government, commercial freedom and commerce.

It couldn't be further from the current truth. For instance the Tories are presiding over a period where the tax take is at it's highest in history. Spending has increased while the Tories have been in office despite austerity.

Rather than helping commerce, the Tories have increased Business rates.

The Tories are stifling freedom by allowing HMRC to persue spurious IR35 claims, going far and above the original remit of the IR35 rules. It's now so bad it's stifling self-employment. Anyone that is thinking about working for an employment agency on a self-employed basis has to be very careful not to be caught out by IR35 rules. Hardly the swashbuckling commercial freedom the Tories are reknown for.

The current Tory government are not Tories of old. they are Blairites: Red Tories that push a Socialist agenda rather than tradiational conservative policies.

The same goes for labour: they are no longer for the working man. Instead, after the Blair years they were for the big global corporations.  The Blairite agenda has now passed to the Tories.

Instead Labour are now run buy middle-class trots: paople who beleive that reviving far left ideas will somehow gain us a Socialist Utopia. A bit like Venezuela. Aparrently by borrowing an infinite amount of money (that somehow doesn't have to be paid back with interest), Labour can cure all the ills of UK.

With an infinite amount of money the NHS can be saved. Yeah right, only if you sort out the incompetence and the massive amount of money going to lawyers over negligence claims.

I just wish the veil would be lifted and the population of the UK can see what I see: a disunited UK, a labour party that doesn't not fight for the working guy, Tories that do not fight for small businesses, political parties that do not promote the UK population but instead put immigrants on a pedestal, that somehow self-employment has become a dirty word and that everyone needs to be classed as PAYE unless you're a big corporation that can negotiate a deal on tax (like tax is negotiable for the rest of us...).