There is one question that counts when you cast your vote: have they made life better? This month, the Conservatives will have been in office for 12 years. Today, in the local elections, we have a chance to pass judgment on their record. What does it look like?
It’s an astonishing thing, but it is genuinely hard to think of government policies that, in this period, have improved life for people other than the richest and most privileged. There are a handful. There’s the same-sex marriage legislation passed during David Cameron’s first term, though it was developed by the Liberal Democrats and opposed by a majority of Conservative MPs. There’s a higher threshold for paying income tax, a higher minimum wage (though it falls short of a genuine living wage), shared parental leave and automatic pensions enrolment. There’s the Modern Slavery Act 2015, no-fault divorces, the law against coercive behaviour, an improved highway code, the carbon floor price, the soft drinks levy and payments for plastic bags. Cameron oversaw a successful Olympics, and Boris Johnson’s government executed an effective vaccination programme.
