Bercow attacks 'uncaring' image

A senior Tory frontbencher yesterday attacked the party's "prissy", uncaring attitudes, insisting that the "cold war" on gays should end and a new war on poverty should begin.

John Bercow, the Shadow Work and Pensions minister, warned: "In the past we seemed shrill, homophobic and eerily detached from the lives of many of our fellow citizens."

He told a fringe meeting: "We have come across as an overwhelmingly rural, provincial and, dare I say it, prissy party. We have seemed detached from the public-service issues which affect city residents. We are organisationally weaker in urban constituencies than at any time I can remember."

Mr Bercow savaged the Conservatives' attitudes to poverty, warning: "Our problem is that we have lost the reputation that we can cope, without acquiring the reputation that we care."

He condemned the Tories' opposition to the minimum wage as a "catastrophic blunder" and called for a review of benefits, "not to remove them from the poorest in society, but to ensure they work effectively."

He also condemned discrimination on grounds of sex, age, race, disability or sexual orientation: "Of course, there is scope for debate about the means by which to end discrimination, but there should be no quarrel about the need to do so. The case for equal treatment is not about political correctness. It is about human decency."