It was entirely understandable that many of us might have forgotten what the actual Conservative party looked like during the febrile campaign for Scottish independence. Of course there were stark reminders, such as when George Osborne made a couple of forays north like a latter-day Rachman, forcing up the rent and threatening his tenants with summary eviction.

Or when Theresa May and Philip Hammond warned us that an independent Scotland would become the most defenceless and vulnerable geopolitical state in the world. Perhaps it simply didn’t occur to them that in so doing they were painting a massive target on the map of Scotland with an arrow pointing south and the words: “This way if you want to launch an attack on the UK.”

Such was the Labour party’s eagerness to kill off Scottish independence that for 18 months it simply morphed into the Tory party. It made common cause with the Cameron and Osborne Bullingdon Front in the great Currency Fear and opted to chastise nationalists for expressing concern over austerity and the future of the NHS instead of opposing these themselves.

Ed Miliband may have mentioned welfare in his keynote conference speech the other week but, in truth, his party has been forgetting about it for an entire generation now. By the time Labour lined up meekly to acquiesce in the start of another war in the Middle East it was impossible to see where British Labour ended and British Conservatism began.

So it was refreshing last week in Birmingham to be reminded that the Tories are still with us and that the 2014 lot are just as toxic and reactionary as any that have ever existed before. When Labour supporters among the union’s 55% finally tire of having their tummies tickled in gratitude by Cameron and Miliband, Osborne and Balls, the Tory party conference gave them a sharp reminder of what they had actually preserved.

You’ve got to hand it to the Tories – they don’t mess around pretending to be something they’re not and by God they don’t half enjoy pulling the chair away from dear, naive old Gordon Brown once they’ve got him to do their bidding – again and again and again. In the absence of hunting with hounds, it’s the closest the aristocracy gets to a blood sport these days.

When he was buying the confidence of independence waverers with that “vow” malarkey it was dashed unsporting of them not to tell him that extra devolved powers to Scotland would be linked to English votes for English laws. Why, just look at him now: running around trying to get the sweaties to sign a petition telling us to fulfil our side of the bargain… or else. Or else what, suckers? By jove, this is better than anything by Noël Coward and old Larry would be in his element.

So let’s recap on the Conservative party conference when it finally got down to business after congratulating Ruth Davidson for saving the union and inviting her to sit beside Samantha as a special treat. First up was Osborne refusing to ease austerity and instead opting to penalise 10 million households with a two-year freeze on benefits and tax credits.

More than 5 million of these are families working hard on low wages and not the workshy layabouts who are the customary targets of Conservative party conferences. And just in case any of those blue-collar chappies were to become truculent there was a promise to make tax cuts to the tune of £7bn that will benefit middle income and high wage earners.

Then we had Theresa May announcing a wide assortment of orders in her continuing quest to ban so-called Islamic extremists or those who indulge in activities “for the purposes of overthrowing democracy”. Which brand of democracy that might be and who it is who gets to decide if it has been sufficiently threatened has not yet been decided. Perhaps some of the bankers whose greed and corruption almost led to martial law following the near-collapse of the financial system may now get their comeuppence. Aye right.

Surely though, she wouldn’t get away with any of this nonsense about targeting the fuzzy-wuzzies while the European Convention on Human Rights is in place? Oh wait… there’s Chris Grayling delivering his ultimatum to European judges that Britain will flout their human rights rulings or else it would choose to leave the system. And thus we all got a masterclass in how Conservatives first target the “wrong” type of democracy and then remove the means – the ECHR – by which they can be prevented from doing so.

So there we have it, this year’s Tory recipe for a fair and upright society: choose to hit the poor and the vulnerable; choose to intimidate those whom you deem to be scrofulous and impolite in their political views; choose to attack basic human rights; choose to allow ruthless big business to pay their workers buttons and sack them at will.

Before its annual conference in Manchester the previous week, Labour was ahead in the polls, but following the Tory colloquium the lead has become blue. And we now also know what the rest of the United Kingdom is thinking as we prepare for next year’s Westminster elections and thus a glimpse of what sort of country Britain will become if the Tories are returned.

Scotland had an opportunity to decouple from this model but a clear majority of us obviously felt that we could live with that risk and perhaps even thrive. It is a decision that must be respected and lest anyone be tempted to cry “foul” there was no cheating. It is a decision with which we will all have to live now.

It also means that, if we don’t like the tenor of this type of society or if our poorest become more marginalised and excluded than before and our human rights and dignity of employment are eroded just that little bit more, then we can have no complaints. And no longer can we blame the “fucking Tories”.