I wonder if many of your readers are as confused as I am when thinking what the Conservative Party stands for, seeing that an election is looming.

When they first came to power in 2010, they did what they said on the packet: l Slashed public building projects like Building Schools For The Future l Sacked public servants and started a ‘race for the bottom’ for their conditions and pensions l Introduced half-baked ideas like the bedroom tax.

Now the Tories would like to be thought of as a party of low taxation, yet immediately they increased VAT to 20 per cent.

Let’s not forget the last Government reduced it by the same amount and had a stamp duty holiday to stimulate the economy.

The Tories also like to be thought of as financially prudent.

However, the muddle they introduced over child benefit has been negated by giving a subsidy to parents over free school meals, no matter what one earns.

Red tape is always high on Tory Party slogans when they themselves introduce it.

Apparently they have a scheme whereby a household’s recyclables are weighed and this offsets the council tax.

If this isn’t a recipe for confusion and misunderstanding I don’t know what is.

It remains to be seen where the Government is going to get the money it is taking away from hospitals over the car parking nightmare.

Apparently we are to have a new set of rules (red tape or necessary protection?) to safeguard our food.

It is to be administered by health inspectors....oh! Having sacked one in five since coming to power, this will be a problem. No joined up thinking here.

Having made soldiers compulsorily redundant one wonders if we can withstand attacks.

Mrs Thatcher commented, “We always know whose money it is.”

Now her successors are willy-nilly asking people to sign up for more school places than they can fill, in the name of choice.

It would be interesting if, as a consequence, they build more schools than they need and what they do about the empty places.

That issue was, if my memory serves me correctly, one that one of our current Tory MPs campaigned on previously, now his party is deliberately squandering money.

I feel the Tories, having started their term in office as the “Nasty Party”, seem to have lost their way.

Bob Pixton, Abney Moor, Swindon