Phil King: Conservatives must be the defenders and cheerleaders of free speech and liberty, not its silencers

Cllr Phil King is the Deputy Leader of the Conservative Group on Harborough District Council. He is also the Area Chairman for Leicester & Leicestershire Conservatives

The eve of a Conservative Party Conference should focus minds. This year, it must. Britain faces rising global threats and mounting domestic pressures. Serious times demand serious politicians.

In my last ConservativeHome article, I argued that “Conference must show Conservative leadership again.” That call has only grown more urgent. Across Leicester and Leicestershire, and indeed across the country, we see the real cost of drift and denial. Labour reaches for new taxes, Reform reaches for new slogans — but neither offers the competence our communities deserve.

For too long, too many in politics — including in our own ranks — chased headlines and hashtags instead of delivery. We veered too far to the woke and the broke: gesture over graft, slogans over substance. That vacuum was filled by Labour with higher taxes and by Reform with empty promises. Neither will secure Britain’s future.

I have been involved in our Party for over fifty years, since delivering my first leaflet as a ten-year-old. Like thousands of others, I stayed the course because I believed the Conservatives stood for freedom, responsibility, patriotism and service. But today, many of us who have given a lifetime of loyalty feel ignored, sidelined, and taken for granted.

As Hon. Treasurer of the Conservative Councillors’ Association, I see daily what our grassroots achieve. Over 4,000 Conservative councillors deliver frontline services, balance impossible budgets, and prove that competence still exists. Yet our councillors and members have too often been treated as an afterthought. For too long, MPs talked at us, instead of listening.

As members, we need to regain our voices and our powers. Without them, the Party risks losing not only its roots, but its reason to exist. We have already lost the trust of too many loyal blue voters, while failing to win the respect of enough new ones. Unless we rebuild that bond, we will slide towards irrelevance.

Renewal also means defending freedom. We must reject the march of the totalitarian tendency to micro-manage every aspect of our lives. Just because the state can intervene, doesn’t mean it should. Our citizens’ rights to free speech — to criticise, to satirise, to mock those in power — are at deadly risk of erasure. The policing of so-called “thought crimes” has no place in a free society and must be stopped. Conservatives must be the defenders and cheerleaders of free speech and liberty, not its silencers.

And still, some in our Party do not grasp the clear and present danger. We are on the precipice of nothing less than the extinction of the Conservative Party. If we carry on as we are — ignoring members, ducking tough choices, indulging in gestures — then our century-old movement will be swept aside by Labour’s machine and Reform’s noise. Renewal is no longer optional; it is existential.

The warning signs are already plain. Labour’s Chancellor is plotting yet more tax heists, after her raid on farming & business inheritances — vindictive measures we highlighted in the County Council chamber only last week. In Harborough, their Lib Dem, Labour and Green coalition has presided over the collapse of the district’s housing supply while wasting £567,000 in a single year on temporary accommodation. That is not leadership; it is drift and waste. Reform UK councillors, meanwhile, have blamed “mass immigration” for falling water levels in a reservoir. Comedy politics may raise eyebrows, but it won’t fix the country.

Residents are not asking for drama or distraction. They are asking for serious government: to grow the economy, control spending, protect our country and back British farming. If we fail to meet that test, they will not forgive us.

In Leicester, Labour’s City Mayor refused to join the East Midlands Combined Authority. While Nottingham and Derby push ahead with devolved investment, Leicester is left behind. It is a case study in why competence matters.

We are now running into next year’s crucial local elections. These contests will set the tone for what follows. They will show whether we can regain trust, reconnect with our base and convince new voters that we are still the party of competence. Our leaders need to show what they are made of — fast.

Historically, Conservatives have united pragmatism with principle, local delivery with national ambition. That is the tradition we must reclaim. Not endless ideological battles. Not fantasy economics. Not empty gestures. But the serious, patient work of governing well.

That means standing firm in defence of our country and its fundamental values — freedom, responsibility, accountability, and the right of every citizen to speak their mind without fear of the so-called “Starmer Stasi.”

Conference is our chance. If we seize it, we can prove again that Conservatives deliver. If we waste it, then extinction is not a headline — it is our future.

Because from Leicester to Lincoln, from Harborough to Hertfordshire, the message from residents is clear: they don’t want chaos or comedy. They want competence. And only Conservatives, at our best, can provide it.

The clock is ticking. Time waits for no one — not even a Party leader.