Oliver Cooper: Backing same-sex marriage won’t decide the next election – but it will decide elections decades from now

Oliver Cooper is National Chairman of Conservative Future.  Follow Oliver on Twitter.

The Conservative Party is the oldest political party in the world, having managed change from one era to the next more successfully than any other.  We are, after all, a party founded by Robert Peel’s acceptance of the Great Reform Act – the original Tory opposition to which put the Conservative Party on the wrong side of history and the electorate and which Disraeli believed cost it greatly for four decades.

The bill legalising same-sex marriage reaches its third reading in the House of Commons this week and is another test of our long-term survival instincts.  For my part, I've supported marriage equality for ten years – I, like most  peoplemy age, simply can’t understand why people shouldn't be able to celebrate their love the same way, no matter who they love.  Ideally, government should get out the business of marriage altogether – and leave it to couples and communities to decide – but this bill does the next best thing.

Opposing it doesn't make you a bigot or a homophobe – a label far too many are willing to apply to those voting against.  There are many religious objections to same-sex marriage - while the bill introduces safeguards to protect churches, I won't try to persuade MPs that feel their own religious beliefs stop them voting for the bill.  But to those that are open to persuasion, I’d like to make a plea from the next generation.

While most voters support same-sex marriage, it’s undoubtedly, and regrettably, the case that most Conservative voters oppose it.  But those that voted Conservative in 2010 are the least likely voters to rank it as a major issue.  After all, we’re Conservatives; we care more about the big issues – like fixing our economy, our schools, and our welfare system – and we should be proud that we do.

Oliver Cooper: Inequality will widen until banking is reformed

Oliver Cooper is a Conservative activist and member of the Progressive Conservatives.

The seven people that read the New Statesman must have had a shock the other week to find that “we’re not all in this together”.  It must come as a surprise to find their biases confirmed in such a way.

So David Blanchflower revealed, a combination of high inflation and pay increases in the financial sector are threatening to increase inequality.  And right he is.  But what we’re experiencing now – inflation and the unending enrichment of bankers – is Blanchflower’s coup de grace.

The keen-eyed among you will remember ‘Danny’ as a former member of the Monetary Policy Committee, as his NS biography indeed brags.  He was one of the people appointed by Gordon Brown’s Treasury to set interest rates, and was thus responsible for controlling inflation.

And in that role, he stood out.  Not as an inflation hawk, but as a man obsessed with printing more and more money.  For nineteen straight months, he voted to cut interest rates and prime the presses.  He was Mr Quantitative Easing.  That’s a particularly bizarre way to prevent inflation.

Oliver Cooper: A truly Big Society would be agnostic towards churches

Oliver Cooper is Head of Policy & Media for the Conservative Humanist Association.

“Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s and unto God that which are God’s.”  So begins every Christian discussion of secularism.  Jesus didn’t discuss what Caesar should do with what has been rendered unto him.  It seems the Big Society was not in vogue in 1st Century Judaea.  Fortunately, public service decentralisation is in vogue now – allowing Paul Goodman to open the debate earlier in the week.

As an atheist and as a Conservative, I want the government to clear space in the public square for communities.  Of all sorts.  In all services.  This means broadening supply of healthcare and education and devolving welfare provision to target aid at the most vulnerable.

Allowing more providers is common sense conservatism, but focusing on religious groups quietly commits two fallacies: that we can decide who is best-placed to do so from on high and that churches are the best-placed.  Indeed, for some people, churches are worse-placed.  The Church of England’s Moral, But No Compass report, which Paul cited, represented a final thrust for theocracy – saying on p87 that Christian-run public services would have an evangelical mission.  Fine for a few, but not for most.