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I'm definitely a Tory. My dad was a Conservative councillor, and I spent years as a child knocking on doors with him. I'm a Tory because I'm passionate about business and enterprise. But I am also a compassionate Conservative. There should always be a net through which no one should fall.

I'm a political conservative.

What I enjoy doing is challenging stereotypes of what people believe a Tory must be. You don't have to say every Tory is in it for themselves - it's pathetic caricaturing that has no place in the 21st century, and if we can challenge that stereotype, then great.

People look at me, they know I've appeared in costume dramas and they automatically assume I must be a Tory, I must be a certain type of person.

Myself, I'm a post-ideological conservative.

Well, I feel that everybody in the country knows me. I think people know who I am, and that I'm deputy leader of the Labour party, and that I'm out there talking about their big choice for the future.

I think I'm probably just an old-fashioned Tory. I don't wake up each morning trying to figure out what kind of Conservative I am; for me it's quite instinctive.

So I'm a pretty conservative fellow, but not conservative enough for the Tea Party.