Cllr James Tucker (Conservative), Tregolls, Truro

Work-life balance, like the four-day working week that I advocate, is the foundation of resilience. Yet for the middle class, balance is becoming increasingly unattainable.

Rising costs of housing, energy, and essentials collide with stagnant wages and insecure work, leaving families stretched thin. The middle class is tired: tired of being told to “work harder”, tired of carrying the tax burden, tired of promises of stability that never materialise.

Just as lip service to balance leads to burnout, lip service to economic fairness leads to the erosion of the very group that once anchored society since the industrial revolution. We must now recognise that wellbeing and security are as vital as GDP growth. We must not drift into the future, but engage in debate as to what comes after capitalism.

The middle class was long seen as the backbone of democracy and prosperity. But when balance is impossible - when debt, precarity, and overwork define daily life - the middle class wellbeing begins to crumble.

Having recently supported a local cause for an additional mental health care and wellbeing provision for Truro, I am worried; this isn’t just about economics, it’s about identity. The promise that hard work secures dignity and stability is breaking down. If the middle class collapses, we risk losing the social glue that holds communities together.

The exhaustion of the middle class raises a profound question; if capitalism no longer delivers stability, what comes next? Post-capitalist visions are broad, interesting and some worrying, and with the onset of AI, the challenge is clear: without deliberate reform and the redistribution of wealth, we risk sliding into systems that entrench inequality even further.

We must confront the limits of capitalism - rethinking ownership, and the role of work in human life.