Dr David Starkey appeared at a Conservative Party conference fringe meeting

OUTSPOKEN historian Sir David Starkey said the UK should be looking for solutions to cost-cutting from the Victorian age as he appeared at a conference fringe meeting on Monday.

As members discussed ways to lower taxes and shrink the welfare state, Dr Starkey said that every time he heard the word compassion it made him want “to reach for my revolver” as it was a word for “easy times”.

“We’ve got to understand that the future is not always the solution. We, as Conservatives, should be much more confident about talking about earlier solutions,” he said.

“The Victorians solved so many of these problems. They had no notion of universality. Welfare was the exception, not the rule. We ought to go back to that. We have got to introduce, I’m afraid, the carrot as well as the stick.

“The Victorians had the absolute principle of less eligibility, that is to say that nobody on welfare received any more than the absolute minimum liveable wage.”

Dr Starkey lives in Bloomsbury, although is not involved in the party’s organising efforts in Holborn and St Pancras.

Once a regular panellist on programmes like Question Time, he has complained of being “cancelled” after controversies caused by comments on race and culture.

A guest of the TaxPayers’ Alliance and the PopCon pressure group– Popular Conservatism – he was part of a session in a packed marquee on the conference grounds in Birmingham.

He said there was a risk of a “genuinely nasty revolution” and a “deliberate war targeted on the so-called rich”. But Dr Starkey also said: “I’m really looking forward to these next five years. I think its going to be wonderful for Conservatism. Our job is to pin every single disaster on them [Labour]. And the disasters, ladies and gentlemen, will be legion.”

He added: “It will be horrible for the country – from our point of view, it will be absolutely excellent. But we’ve got to explain, what’s gone wrong.

“I’m a historian but I think at this moment you can prophesise that this government is going to fail. It’s going to fail resoundingly and crashingly, and these are the reasons why – Labour created the mess, Labour represent the mess, Labour cannot change the mess and we can.”

The panel drew a large crowd to a packed marquee

His colourful comments drew rounds of applause and guffaws from the audience members watching on. Across the conference, fringe meetings were being held to try and frame the ongoing leadership debate. Robert Jenrick has emerged as the candidate seen with views closest to those expressed at the PopCon meeting, but individual contenders were not being endorsed.

The meeting, however, did reveal the tenor of some of the discussions taking place and what the candidates are being lobbied about.

Mark Littlewood, the director of the PopCon group, said: “The electorate’s stated preferences are rather different from their revealed preference. If you do an opinion poll asking would you like the NHS to get more money, you’ll get the response: Oh yes, that sounds like a terribly good idea and I wouldn’t mind my tax going up to pay for it, you can tick that box. “But people’s revealed preference – their actual actions – show they are not really convinced of these propositions.

“Very few people decide to submit to HMRC more tax than they are liable for. You do get a few cheques every year coming in, but nobody wants to pay more tax.”

He added: “My solution for this would be to encourage opt-outs. I would be very happy to waive my right to NHS treatment in return for a tax break. “I am happy to waive my right to the state pension in return for tax break or NI contributions.

“If you give people the option of saying, I don’t want the state service, I’d rather run the money myself, you begin to unravel it. It’s not a silver bullet but it’s not a bad bronze bullet.”

John O’Connell, of the TPA, drew more roaring laughs when he added: “We went out in Upper Street in Islington with an iPad and asked people if they wanted to pay more tax. “We got the iPad out and said ‘there you go, you can go on the HMRC website and do it’. Nobody wanted to.”