Compassionate, caring, green: this is how David Cameron presented himself before the election. Once in Downing Street, he threw off his disguise. The laid-back old-school Tory emerged as the leader of a party on a break-neck mission to fulfill Margaret Thatcher’s vision. Looking in detail at the government’s policies during their first two years in power, Polly Toynbee and David Walker warn that by the next election the welfare state may be in irrecoverable ruins.