Lord Willetts is now a Conservative peer, but was a demographer for the Conservative Party. The policies that have impoverished the young are all Conservative p

Lord Willetts is now a Conservative peer, but was a demographer for the Conservative Party. The policies that have impoverished the young are all Conservative policies: allowing the cost of housing to grow faster than wages, privatisation, and deregulation. In the eighteenth century, Edmund Burke argued that a conservative party must remain pragmatic, and until Thatcher, the Tories had the discipline to do so. For the past four decades, they have chained themselves to one ideology, and the fortunes of one generation. As that generation fades, so will the party. In the coming general election, the question is not whether the Conservatives will hold power - that matter was settled long ago - but whether they will ever form government again.