THE HERITAGE ACT : Jeremy Hunt and Boris Johnson are trading increasingly generous promises as the Tory leadership contest advances. Daily they up the ante on one another in a bid to appeal to the 0.3% of the population that will decide who next sits on the jelly throne.
While Boris is focusing mostly on distracting infrastructure ideas, buildings and bridges that will never be (which doesn’t mean that his chums in the architectural and legal trades won’t get to fill their boots in the planning), alongside promising paybacks to his backers, Jeremy Hunt has today sought to outflank Johnson by going straight to the nostalgic heart of the Tory Party.
The good old days. The nineteenth century.
“The Factory Act of 1819 limited the hours a child could work to twelve hours a day,” Hunt educated the press corp, “but the liberal, leftie, quinoa munching, snowflake hippitards weren’t happy with even that. That was the thin edge of the wedge. Eventually they would eradicate child labour altogether. Productivity suffered. The wealth of the nation suffered. Children learning a trade straight off the potty was tradition. Where now the noble chimney sweep? The matchmaker? The knocker-upper? It’s part of our heritage. I’m going to bring it back!”
And he’s not stopping there.
“Universal suffrage has delivered us Brexit,” he continued, “this is what happens when women are distracted from caring for their families, the noble domestic path, and when people who weren’t educated at fee paying schools are allowed to vote. 52% was a narrow margin of victory, only achieved through cheating and ridiculous promises. I aim to drive women back into the home. To drive poor children back into employment for wealth creation. To unclutter their minds so that when we hold referendums on abolishing the ban on fox hunting, on bringing back hanging and on dissolving parliament, on eradicating universal suffrage, well, with a sufficiently uneducated population the margin of victory could be as high as 80%!”
Ambitious plans indeed.
But Boris wasn’t going to let Hunt have it all his own way on the nostalgia card.
“A steam locomotive for every home!” he declared, while navigating a hedge to escape a reporter, “and the return of cardboard shoes for redcoats. I’ll make them myself!”
If this is where they are today, with some weeks left, what will they be promising tomorrow?
The return of the Witchfinder General?