With the next election likely to be fought on Labour's agenda, and with David Cameron claiming that the Conservative's priorities can be summed up by the three letters NHS, it is already apparent how shallow that claim is.
The grotesque Daniel Hannon, Conservative MEP, had been attacking the NHS on the American Fox News Channel long before he became the darling of the Conservatives' Spring Conference. Only now has Cameron made a half-hearted attempt to distance himself from Hannon's comments.
And with poor Alan Duncan MP, the Conservative's shadow Leader of the House, forced to live on the "rations" of an MP's salary, the gloss is beginning to tarnish on the Conservative Party nationally.
We in the Forest of Dean need no reminder of just how unpleasant, self-seeking and selfish some Conservatives are. The lamentable performance of the Conservative administration on the Forest of Dean District Council proves the point.
In less than two and a half years, there have been six defections from the Conservatives to the Independents. So bitter has been their in-fighting that their erstwhile leader Marion Winship was challenged within a year of her election. Now she has fallen to a coup by the Conservative cabinet, the very people that she appointed.
In the two years that the Conservatives have been in overall control of the Forest of Dean District Council, there have been many cuts in services, but I can think of not one area in which services or service delivery has been enhanced. Perhaps the perpetrators of the coup, the remaining Cabinet members could enlighten us.
And whilst they are at it, perhaps they might report on the progress of their plans, flagged up before the last district election, to reduce the council tax for senior citizens. Or was that just a cynical ploy to harvest the grey vote? – Bruce Hogan, Labour and Co-operative District Councillor, Lydbrook and Ruardean, Labour Party PPC, Forest of Dean.