Location: The Heritage Foundation's Lehrman Auditorium

With opinion polls pointing to the election of a Conservative Government in the United Kingdom for the first time since 1997, former leader of the Conservative Party, Iain Duncan Smith, will talk about the importance of the social justice agenda to the renewal of Britain’s Tories. Drawing upon the work of his own independent think tank, the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), he will examine whether there are key lessons to be learned for American conservatives from the conservative renaissance across the Atlantic.

The Centre for Social Justice works with a network of effective poverty-fighting organizations in the UK, bringing their know-how and experience to the formulation of public policy. The CSJ aims to rebuild the traditional family, reduce welfare dependency, increase social well-being and reduce the size of the state.

Iain Duncan Smith is a graduate of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and saw active service in Northern Ireland and Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) as well as serving in Canada and Germany. He was elected to the House of Commons in 1992, and after serving as Shadow Secretary of State for Social Security (1997-1999) and Shadow Secretary of State for Defense (1999-2001), went on to lead the Conservative Party from 2001-2003. He established the Centre for Social Justice in London in 2004, and was appointed Chairman of the Conservative Party’s Social Justice Policy Group in 2005.