The Conservative Party has always expressed the core values of freedom and liberty. The big difference between the Tories and Labour is that the Conservatives believe the individual knows best how to run his or her life.

I object to a Labour government completely getting its priorities wrong. Outrageously, on the day hunting was debated, only a handful of Labour MPs could find the time to debate our troops being sent abroad into a dangerous combat zone yet, a few hours later, they packed the chamber in order to vote against hunting.

I was brought up in a single-parent family. I put myself through university with my mother's help and was taught the values of respect and hard work. The reason I am a Conservative is that the party instils a belief in meritocracy.

If you are good enough and work hard you can succeed, no matter what your background. People such as me don't want hand-outs. We want a hand up to show we can succeed.

Yet within the Labour Party, one sees members who benefited from private education wanting to deny the right to others. How many of the Cabinet went to grammar schools yet actively campaigned for their abolition throughout the Eighties?

Labour is certainly not the all-inclusive party it likes to portray itself as. Indeed, MEP Richard Balfe, on joining the Conservatives after leaving Labour, commented Tony Blair is "mesmerised by millionaires" while sleaze goes to the heart of the Government.

The Labour Party still has an attitude that if you are working class you are almost obliged to vote Labour, yet one only has to speak to the people in Brighton and Hove to see the party no longer represents them.

The Conservative Party is not and has never been a party for the few. It always has and always will represent all decent people who believe in freedom, opportunity and hard work, irrespective of sexuality, race or religion.

The people of Brighton and Hove deserve better and in little more than 12 months will get their chance to have their say.

-Jonathan Sheppard, Coombe Road, Brighton