Conservatives

They are not as dangerous to freedom as Labour but again they lack an intellectual core. Under Thatcher they had a partial one, but this was inconsistent and has since been abandoned anyway. Thatcher tried to mix freedom and controls, with more emphasis on freedom than usual for this century, but being a mixture, it couldn't effectively oppose the socialist ideas that still dominate this country. Hence its capitulation on crucial issues of freedom such as Maastrict, Hong Kong and the health service. Essentially the problem with Conservatism is that it merely 'conserves' the status quo. It cannot fundamentally improve upon it. Conservative 'values' such as family, law and order, and 'free' schools are not fundamentals. You can't tell from these which laws and what kind of order, the Conservatives intend to preserve. Nor if they intend to punish those without families, nor what they intend to teach in their schools. Will they choose the law of Europe or not? They don't know, because they have no fundamental principle to guide them.