CONSERVATIVE leadership hopefuls are using phrases like ‘personal responsibility’ and ‘aspiration nation’ in their speeches. But what do they really mean?
‘No comforting fairy tales’
Rishi Sunak pledged to get tough and confront the problems facing the country head on, rather than telling people ‘comforting fairy tales’. Which translates as ‘everything is going to be f**king awful but I’m still trying to sugarcoat the truth because I want you to make me prime minister’.
‘Low tax, small state, personal responsibility’
All of these phrases, used by Penny Mourdant in her campaign launch speech, are firm favourites with Tory voters. In their ears, they translate to ‘keep your money for yourself rather than giving it to dole scum scroungers’ and ‘you can afford to pay for private health care so f**k everyone else’. No wonder she’s one of the favourites to win.
‘The Ben & Jerry’s tendency’
Kemi Badenoch used this phrase to hit out at businesses who show an interest in social justice as well as profit, but she might as well have just yelled ‘Go woke, go broke!’ like a demented Twitter troll. However, given that Ben & Jerry’s made $170 million last year, it doesn’t seem that their ethical approach is doing them much harm.
‘Our party has lost its sense of self’
Penny Mourdant again, showing plenty of tact with this phrase when presumably what she actually wanted to say was ‘Our party has lost its f**king mind’. A sly little dig at the carnage of the Boris Johnson years, here Penny is promising to get the Tories back to being competently awful rather than chaotically awful.
‘Aspiration nation’
Part of Liz Truss’ campaign speech, ‘aspiration nation’ translates to ‘I reckon I’ve already got this in the bag so I’ll say some vacuous shit that rhymes and not worry about having any policies with real substance’. Unfortunately for Truss it looks like Mourdant is trouncing her, so she may be regretting this snappy little phrase now.
