If anything encapsulates just how out of touch those at the top of the Conservative Party are it is their bizarre use of language, in particular the bandying about of “Trotskyite”, which this week was once again used indiscriminately in connection with the Workfare scheme. Defaming political enemies is as old as the disreputable business of politics itself, but over the past year or so it has been possible to detect a concerted and probably co-ordinated attempt by the Conservatives to label non-conformists as extremists and ideologues. But it is a tactic built on sand and it has already begun to fail.
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