On Monday, the UK welfare state will expand to cover 15 hours of free childcare for working parents with two-year-olds. In September, this will be extended to infants of nine months or more. Next year, cover doubles to 30 hours. The total cost: £5.3 billion a year. It’s the ‘largest ever expansion of childcare in England’s history,’ says Gillian Keegan, the Education Secretary.

This Easter weekend we see the bizarre spectacle of Tories attacking Labour from the left

What is conservative about this? Nothing, of course. It pushes up costs and taxes. But the idea, at the time, was to to do this before Labour proposed it. To shoot Labour’s fox. The problem is that fox is running around because even Labour think this is too much, and is perhaps undeliverable. Bridget Phillipson, the Shadow Education Secretary, says she’d put the whole scheme on pause, pending review.

I can see why Phillipson is sceptical. Why should the childcare costs of millionaires be covered – to the tune of £6,900 a year – by the average taxpayer on £28,000 a year? And who on earth will look after the 285,000 one-year-olds and 323,000 two-years-olds eligible for the scheme? Given the worker shortage crisis (linked to the current welfare crisis) it’s by no means sure that nurseries will be able to find the 27,500 extra staff expected. Nurseries are sounding the alarm, saying their ability to recruit never properly recovered from furlough.

Tories would have done better to make existing childcare costs tax-deductible. This might address a bigger problem: that the UK has the highest childcare costs in the developed world and many new mums drop out of the workforce when they realise their back-to-work salary would, after tax, barely cover the nanny costs. Offering tax relief, rather than an expansion of the state, would also chime with what used to be the general Tory message.

One of the problems the Conservatives face right now is coherence and an inability to explain their mission. A criticism directed at Rishi Sunak is that he positions the Tories as being ‘about delivery’. Amazon is about delivery. Political parties are about a purpose, a cause, which is sold to voters and then, with their consent, acted upon. Had this childcare offer come in the form of tax relief, rather than expansion of the state, it would have been a fight worth having. The policy would have helped explain what the broader purpose is to voting Conservative and how the party’s values may be coherent and attractive.

This Easter weekend we see the bizarre spectacle of Tories attacking Labour from the left. Mel Stride, the Work and Pensions Secretary, portrays Labour as parsimonious saying Phillipson’s plan means ‘cutting support immediately from tens of thousands of parents who have already signed up’. (It doesn’t, she has just promised a review). Jeremy Hunt, the Chancellor, has said Labour plans a ‘hammer blow’ to families by considering the abolition of places he thinks is worth £6,900 a year.

All this makes it harder to work out who the Tories are, what their purpose is, and why someone might support them. If you think the state has already grown out of all proportion to its usefulness and that the resulting tax bill is crushing the life out of the economy, who would you back in this debate? Bridget Phillipson is coming across as the more sensible voice.