Welcome To Zelo Street!

This is a blog of liberal stance and independent mind

Saturday, 10 November 2018

Taxpayers Alliance - Yes, They’re Tories

They insist they are “independent”. They claim to be “non partisan”. They react with outrage - well, faux outrage - when asked if they are really Tories. But the so-called Taxpayers’ Alliance really are Tories. They keep up the protests, but every time the surface is scratched, it comes up Tories, and has done for some years now.
Blue background - no comment

Take the appearance back in 2008 of the TPA’s then head spinner Susie Squire on Nick Ferrari’s LBC show (it’s been going that long, folks), where she told “I’d like to point out that we’re independent - we’re not for the Tories or for Labour or for anyone”. Was she, though, secretly Conservative? “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I can’t have that - that’s outrageous! That’s just absolutely outrageous! Because we’re totally independent, we talk to everyone ... We don’t have a party preference”. Ho yus?

Ms Squire then went to become a SpAd to Iain Duncan Cough at the DWP before becoming press secretary to Young Dave at 10 Downing Street, which is not bad going for a non-Tory. And this was no isolated occurrence: Mark Wallace went from the TPA to ultimately end up at Conservative Home, with Jonathan Isaby travelling in the opposite direction. It just kept on coming up Tories. And there was more.
In September 2012, Windsor Conservatives hosted a Conservative Renewal Conference. This was attended by such luminaries as the loathsome Toby Young, Dan, Dan, The Oratory Man, James “saviour of Western civilisation” Delingpole, Michael Ashcroft, and the serially clueless Tim Montgomerie. One of the key sponsors was, you guessed it, the TPA.

But perhaps, in the intervening period, the TPA has distanced itself from The Blue Team? As if. They conveniently forgot their crusade against public sector waste when London’s formerly very occasional Mayor Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson was, er, wasting public money on the vanity cable car, vanity buses, vanity water cannon, studies for a vanity airport, and the now thankfully aborted vanity Garden Bridge. And they’re still Tories.
We have had this confirmed by one of the TPA’s recent interns, Olivia Maso, who has posted photos from her internship, including a trip to Plymouth with the TPA’s ubiquitous talking head Chloe Westley. And whose banner is that under which they are posing for the camera? Plymouth University Conservatives. Same as the Conservative conferences that the TPA attends every year. Not Labour. Not Lib Dem. Not Green. Just Tory.
Well, well, what a coincidence

The party into which the TPA gets its alumni is the Tories. The party supported by new media outlets where TPA alumni end up is the Tories. The party whose “renewal conference” the TPA sponsored was the Tories. The party their current campaign manager can be seen happily supporting with her presence is the Tories.

So when you see Chloe Westley telling the world how “non partisan” she is, you know someone is being seriously economical with the actualité. The TPA are fellow Tory travellers. Whoever is funding them. Full stop, end of story.
Enjoy your visit to Zelo Street? You can help this truly independent blog carry on talking truth to power, while retaining its sense of humour, by adding to its Just Giving page at

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Surely it is only the Tory voting working middle classes whose taxes keep the benefits pouring in for your average ANTIFA hooligan, Muslim mini-cab driver with 2 families of 8, "asylum seeker" who has travelled past half the world, "homeless" street beggar with bad "habits" etc etc.

Why shouldn't they have a shouty voice as well? Leave them alone or are you lefties going to have a whip round to pay for your pet causes?

Gonzoland said...

Anon 12:01
The main point of the article highlights the fact that the TPA denies being active supporters of the Tory Party. You, anon, on the other hand fail to grasp the message and resort to ignorant rhetoric so, no surprise there.

The Taxpayers' Alliance are very much anti state expenditure on anything.
Want a Hard Brexit? Here's a comment from factgasm in the Guardian: -
"In 1997, in The Sovereign Individual, Rees-Mogg Sr recommended Singapore to readers who were entrepreneurs, as one of several countries that “impose low costs” on business.
Yep, and only this week Singapore's PM Lee Hsien Loong remarked that Singapore should not be model for a post-Brexit UK.
Lee says "Britain has developed a system of state welfare, of government role in the system where the government accounts for 40 to 45 percent of the GDP . . . The Singapore government accounts for 16 percent of the GDP, maybe 17 percent. So to say that you’re going to be like Singapore, are you going to give up two-thirds of your government spending, state pensions and national health?"
Yes, Prime Minister: Brexit was a neoliberal project, the purpose of which, among many things, is to slash the size of the UK public sector to the absolute minimum possible. This is what most Leave voters have yet to grasp - pity them. Brexit was wrapped up in notions of democracy, sovereignty, independence and so forth, but at its core it was always about making the rich richer and to hell with the rest."

Stephen said...

Where do you get your information about these people, anon? The front page of the Daily Express?

And you know Antifa means Anti Fascist, don't you? Orwell and Churchill were both antifa.

Anonymous said...

Where does their funding come from?

An offshore fund? A shell company? The usual ranting righties?

Spenny said...

To the first Anon commenter - Congrats! You've won the latest round of Tory bullshit bingo with that stunning entry.

Chris jf said...

No wonder your anonymous. Anyone, even an Uber gammon like you would be embarrassed of that cack you just spouted.