Gillian Keegan has said Britain is set to “sleepwalk into socialism” if the Labour Party wins a large majority at the election next week.
The education secretary said that the campaign had been “crowded with a hundred polls or so who’ve come up with all kinds of predictions”.
She told Times Radio: “We just want to make sure that this is, as it always is, a very serious decision about who leads the country at times which are going to be difficult ahead”.
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She added: “We understand we’ve already gone through very difficult times with the pandemic, but that’s also left more difficult times ahead. And we just need to make sure that everybody understands that your taxes will go up if you choose a Labour government.
“And we just don’t want people to sleepwalk into socialism. That is what we’re saying.”
The Conservative Party has amped up its attacks on Labour in recent weeks with polling day on 4 July looming.
During Wednesday evening’s BBC debate prime minister Rishi Sunak urged voters not to “surrender” to Labour’s tax, welfare and migration plans.
In his closing statement, Sunak urged voters: “If you are not certain about Labour, don’t surrender to them.”
And on Thursday, the prime minister’s X/Twitter account published a new advert, depicting an older man, a woman and a schoolchild facing backwards with their hands up. It reads: “Don’t surrender your family’s future to Labour.”
It comes after weeks of emphasis on the prospect of a Labour “super-majority” from the Conservative election campaign.
Speaking earlier this month, defence secretary Grant Shapps warned that a Labour landslide could hand Keir Starmer “unchecked” power in government as he made the case for a “proper system of accountability”.
He said: “I think the simple point is that if you want to make sure that in this next government, whoever forms it, that there is a proper system of accountability, then we would argue that you don’t want to have somebody receive a super majority.”
He added: “And in this case, of course, the concern would be that if Keir Starmer were to go into No 10 — it will either be Rishi Sunak or Keir Starmer, there is no other outcome to this election — and if that power was in some way unchecked it would be very bad news for people in this country.”
Shapps said this would amount to “a blank cheque approach, allowing someone to do anything they wanted, particularly when their particular set of plans are so vague.”
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