Mr Osborne promised to 'cut through red tape'

It was important to take on "new ideas" and end all "navel-gazing and self-pity", he told the Tories' annual conference in Blackpool.

Mr Osborne said the chancellor, Gordon Brown, was raising taxes and his party believed "in the state, not society".

Tories had to "cut through the thickets of red tape", he added.

'New ideas'

He echoed Mr Brown's conference speech of 2003, in which he said his party was "best when we are boldest, best when we are united, best when we are Labour".

Mr Osborne said: "We are at our best when we are the party of new ideas. And with simpler, flatter and fairer taxes let us be so again.

Let me tell the chancellor, we Conservatives know a thing or two about creating a share-owning, asset-owning, wealth-owning democracy George Osborne

"We are at our best when we are the party of opportunity."

The party had to take on Mr Brown "when he says that he is going to create a 'share-owning, asset-owning, wealth-owning democracy'."

Mr Osborne said: "Let me tell the chancellor, we Conservatives know a thing or two about creating a share-owning, asset-owning, wealth-owning democracy.

"You don't create an asset-owning democracy by increasing stamp duty and dragging ordinary hard-working families into the net of inheritance tax.

"You don't create a wealth-owning democracy by trapping people in the injustice of a shambolic tax credit system."

Change tradition

It was vital to "stop the flow of damaging regulation from Brussels" and "be the champions of free trade, not shut trade out".

Conservatives had "a tradition of change", having "freed the slaves", given "equal votes to women" and given "the elderly the universal pension and the young universal schooling".

They also "gave ordinary people the opportunity to own their own home and a stake in their community", Mr Osborne said.