Today’s speech really is as important as the hype says it is. If David Cameron delivers a barnstormer and Gordon Brown pulls out of calling an election it will be a major coup for Cameron, giving him a level of personal authority as leader that he hasn’t had to date. Equally if Brown does go for it, this speech will frame whether the election is seen as a foregone conclusion or a genuine contest.
There is, though, another way in which the speech is important. If there is an election before the end of the year, Labour would almost certainly win it. The question then is, as Adam Boulton points out, whether Cameron stays on to fight a second one. If Cameron can re-connect with the grassroots he’ll have a much better chance of getting a second bite at the cherry.
Tim Montgomerie, noting the reception that Iain Duncan Smith got yesterday, thinks that the broken society agenda is the way to the hearts of the activists. This is certainly true. But Cameron also needs to give the audience what he gave them in 2005: hope. By the end of the afternoon, Cameron must be the future again.
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