Team Cameron will be beaming about the press coverage that the speech has garnered. The Sun pretty much endorses Cameron in a leader entitled ‘He’s ready.’ It offers him The Sun’s highest praise, declaring that his “speech could have been lifted straight from a Sun editorial.” The Mail is not quite as keen but does appear to be warming to Cameron.It concludes that “Mr Brown has an increasingly impressive rival for Number 10.”
The traditionally conservative broadsheets, yes I know but there isn’t another word for them yet, give the speech a good review too. The Times writes that “His pitch for the top job was formidable enough that it answered the one question he really posed: can you imagine me as prime minister?” While The Telegraph proclaims that the speech “was the final piece in the jigsaw.”
Considerable energy has been put into wooing The Independent and The Guardian by the Cameroons and it does appear to be paying off. The Guardian editorial might be critical of the lack of policy detail in the speech but it is not hostile and does urge “progressives” to consider that the Tory party might actually have changed. The Independent is positively enthusiastic: “In each of his previous conference speeches, David Cameron managed to exceed ever-higher expectations, and he did so again yesterday.”
Judging from today’s papers it looks like Cameron will head into the next election with the right-wing press behind him and the left-wing press, with the exception of the Mirror, open to him and his ideas. All this will help frame the debate in a way that is favourable to Cameron and enhances his chance of winning with a big majority.
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