Chancellor George Osborne was today forced to defend a Conservative party advert aimed at working class voters, claming 'they' enjoy bingo and cheap beer.
Conservative Party chairman Grant Shapps took to Twitter last night to launch an advert devised by Tory HQ to highlight Budget measures supposedly aimed at ‘hardworking people’.
But it has been widely mocked online, and spawned spoof versions referring to whippets, clogs, eating swans, shooting poor people and suggesting the Tories think it is still 1961. The advert read: ‘Bingo! Cutting the bingo tax and beer duty to helphardworking people do more of the things they enjoy.’ Mr Shapps urged Conservative supporters to ‘spread the word.
After waves of criticism and ridicule, a Tory source insisted: 'We stand by the advert.'
But the Lib Dems accused their coalition partners of being 'patronising', Labour said it was ‘condescending’ and the writers of political comedy The Thick Of It said they would have rejected it from a script for being 'too far-fetched'.
In a round of media interviews this morning Mr Osborne was repeatedly asked to defend the advert, distracting from his key announcements on help for savers and pensioners.
The landlord of my local used to say that a penny on a pint meant that beer would have to go up by 10p.I havent seen a 10p drop when its a penny off..No wonder pubs are empty. £3.90 for a pint of Estrella in my local, fucking stuff is brewed in Bedford............
OFF HAND
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Thu Mar 20, 2014 2:46 pm (Last edited: Thu Mar 20, 2014 2:48 pm)
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