David Davis to call for faith in the free market
PROMINENT backbench Conservative MP David Davis will today sound a rallying call to an audience of 150 City and political leaders, calling on them to reinvigorate Britain’s faith in capitalism and private wealth creation.
Davis will be speaking at the London Forum, hosted by pro-market think tanks the Legatum Institute and the US American Enterprise Institute. He will tell the gathering, to include figures from Goldman Sachs, easyJet and the American and German embassies, that a downbeat message of deficit reduction and public sector job cuts will not be enough to win over voters.
Instead, he will say that cuts must be allied with deregulation to jumpstart Britain’s competitiveness: “We need to create more entrepreneurs – people who will risk their money and their reputation on a wealth-creating idea.” Davis is known as a flag-bearer for the right wing of his party, having served as the Tories’ shadow home secretary under Michael Howard.
In a veiled reference to the Conservatives’ Liberal Democrat allies, he will warn that “foolish friends are even more dangerous than deadly enemies” and will tell the government to stand firm on cuts in the face of a coming “storm of protest” from unions, activists and media critics.