Cameron vows to reclaim core Tory values from Left

David Cameron will mount a brazen raid on traditional Labour territory today by promising to create local "co-operatives" to help people run their own public services.

Mr Cameron is to insist that such groups embody core Conservative values, and it is time to reclaim them from the political Left.

The audacious bid to adopt one of the foundation stones of the Labour movement is the latest sign of the Tories' growing confidence after a torrid spell for Gordon Brown.

It is likely to be seen as particularly bold because Mr Cameron has chosen to unveil the move in Manchester - the birthplace of co-operatives and a Labour stronghold where the party has been struggling to make inroads.

Mr Cameron will announce the establishment of a Conservative Co-operative Movement to help people form groups to take control of their local public services, and pledge that a Tory Government would give them the power to open and run schools.

"In other countries co-operative education is central to the system," he will tell an audience of activists.

"Over 100 schools in Sweden are co-ops. Over 600 schools in Spain.

"So I want to explore how we can create a new generation of co-operative schools in Britain - funded by the taxpayer but owned by parents and the local community."

Mr Cameron is expected to say that co-ops encapsulate his vision of "social responsibility", and should not be exclusively Labour's domain.

"The co-op movement has generally been associated with the political left," he will say.

"I think that's a shame. First, because there have always been people on the centre-right concerned about the effects of capitalism on the social fabric.

"Men like Carlyle and Disraeli, following the tradition of Edmund Burke and Adam Smith himself, who recognised at the outset of the industrial revolution that profit was not the only organising principle of a healthy society.

"And second, because the co-operative principle captures precisely the vision of social progress that we on the centre-right believe in: the idea of social responsibility, that we're all in this together, that there is such a thing as society - it's just not the same thing as the state."

Mr Cameron will share the platform today with former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith, who is launching a new report into social problems in Manchester.

Giving parents the power and cash to open new schools if those in their area were failing was a key recommendation from the Tory policy group on social justice led by Mr Duncan Smith.

"Our idea was to create 'pioneer' schools where parents can get together and set up their own schools," Mr Duncan Smith told Press Association.

"They are about communities coming together to say, 'we don't have to put up with this (failing school) any more'.

"The money would follow the parents and they can set up a school."

Co-operative groups from all over Britain banded together to form a political arm, the Co-operative Party, in the final stages of the First World War.

The party soon developed an electoral alliance with Labour which in practice meant they acted as a single entity.

There are still more than 25 MPs in the Commons who stood as candidates for 'Labour and the Co-operative Party' at the last general election - including Schools Secretary Ed Balls.

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