Conservative party conference: Tories sound like they 'turned their back on modern Britain', Justice Minister claims

Mr Gyimah said young voters must be placed 'front and centre' of the next election effort

Justice minister Sam Gyimah has claimed the Conservatives sounded too managerial and as if they had “turned their back on modern Britain” at the recent snap election.

In a stark warning to his colleagues on the second day of the Tory party conference in Manchester, Mr Gyimah said the party’s message at the election on the economy risked voters being unable to imagine being prosperous.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4, the justice minister said that young people had to be “front and centre” of the next campaign to combat the threat of the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn.

“I remember saying to one politician we should get the youth vote,” he said. “To which, the reply was: show me a politician who wants to get a youth vote and I’ll show you a loser.

“Too often we [Conservatives] have sounded managerial, we have made dealing with our debts and dealing with the day to day almost sound like that stands in the way of still being able to imagine a world in which people can still have a prosperous future.

“They’ve got to be front and centre of that vision and that didn’t come across in the last general election. But also we sounded like we had turned our back on modern Britain.

Torsten Bell, the director of the Resolution Foundation, added that one of the biggest lessons of the June’s snap election is that “you should not call a general election at a time when wages are falling”.

Mr Gyimah’s comments come after the Prime Minister told a reception at the Conservative party conference in Manchester that her party had to re-fight the political battles of the past to combat the rise of Mr Corbyn as Labour leader.

She said: “We thought we had made those arguments for free market economies, that we had won them and there was a political consensus.What we have seen with Jeremy Corbyn is we have to make those arguments all over again.

“We will be out there, giving the reasons to people why the Conservative way is the right way, why the Conservative way is the best way to deliver on the issues that really matter to people day in and day out.

“We will be relentless in taking that argument to the Labour Party.”