How the Tories turned me into a Labour councillor

General elections have a way of focusing the mind and crystallising the differences between Britain’s political parties. And so the old accusation that “you’re all the same” seems to have lost its resonance in recent weeks. The Greens and UKIP are receding in the polls, and the traditional red-blue choice is returning to the fore.

The stark choice between five more years of Dickensian policies under David Cameron’s Tories or an economy that works for all under Ed Miliband’s Labour is at the forefront of people’s minds. And they know how much this choice matters.

So if the Tories are successful in concentrating the election debate on the economy, then let us be confident in stating the huge and meaningful differences between our economic plan and theirs. See Sunny Hundal’s excellent recent article on this for some powerful distinctions between the Tory and Labour plans.

In actual fact, I think the clear red water between Labour and the Tories is about something much, much deeper than the scale of deficit reduction. It is about values.You saw from David Cameron’s non-appearance at the challengers debate just how out of touch the Tories are with the struggles of ordinary working people. They. Just. Don’t. Get. It.

I have some valuable first-hand experience of this. In 2011, as a young, impressionable Politics graduate straight out of university, I spent 6 weeks interning for a backbench Tory MP. Beyond the worryingly small number of benefits cases that were processed by this particular MP’s office, I sensed a serious lack of awareness about the plight of people suffering under austerity.

Concerns about the cost of living, the jobs crisis and struggling frontline services were batted away with platitudes about “the mess Labour left this country in” and “the government’s long-term economic plan.” I saw no genuine concern for the people literally starving and freezing to death under this government.

If anything made me realise I was Labour, it was this. I’d voted Labour at the first opportunity in 2010, but I wasn’t particularly tribal at that point. And yet, after a few weeks seeing the Tories at close quarters, I knew how sharp the difference was between my values and theirs.

I moved to Putney soon after and joined the Labour Party. I will never forget the feeling of warmth I experienced when I entered my first ever branch meeting there. That has stayed with me, and always will. Labour values are clear: a sense of community, sharing wealth fairly and looking after the most vulnerable.

When I moved to Brent the following year, I decided to put myself forward for selection as a Labour councillor because I saw this as the best way to help protect my new home and community from the Tories. In Brent, we are pioneering our own Living Wage policy, defending vital services and forcing landlords to become more responsible through landlord licensing.

To me these are simply values of decency. And so the choice at this election is clearer than ever – either standing up for the needs of the vast majority of people who are worse off now than they were in 2010, or giving the Tories the chance to tear our society apart once and for all.

I’ll be voting Labour, and if you believe in equality, fairness and yes, society, you will be too.

Sam Stopp is a Labour councillor for Wembley Central