Politics

They stopped letting people into the conference hall for George Osborne’s speech long before the Shadow Chancellor took to the platform – it was packed, not even standing room.  There was certainly an anticipatory buzz among Tory supporters, particularly after some of the policy announcements trailed in the papers this morning.  One delegate assured me that “this is the speech when George will convince the nation that he’s the man to deal with Brown’s mess.”  Everyone seemed pretty breathless. So did he pull it off?  Well, my immediate response is “yes and no”.  Probably more “yes” than “no”.  There was much that was impressive in the speech.  Osborne touched on

So what do the Tories make of Alistair Darling’s limelight-grabbing decision to freeze public sector pay? The ones I’ve spoken to seem perfectly relaxed with it. A little bit annoyed perhaps: wouldn’t you be, if your opponents appeared to cynically delay an announcement that they could have made during their own party conference last week?  But they’re confident that the public will see through the stunt, and that it will actually reflect badly on Brown & Co.  On top of that, the Tories are sure that Labour will make little headway in a news agenda that will be dominated by Tory announcements for the next few days. It’s hard to

Of all the countless leaflets, pamphlets and circulars being handed out in Manchester, one of the most interesting is a glossy collection of essays entitled Cameron’s Britain.  It has been put together by the folk at Portland PR – who recently hosted that “war game” which James reported back on – and has entries on everything from the NHS to tackling global poverty. As it doesn’t seem to be online, I figured it’s worth quoting from one of the most insightful essays of the bunch: that by Steve Morris, a former Downing St adviser, on the Whitehall machinery that the next government will have to get to grips with.  Norris

The official conference guide announces that at 2pm tomorrow “Alan Duncan, Shadow Leader of the House of Commons” will be speaking in a session entitled “Reforming politics: Transparency”. Of course, he won’t be. He is no longer shadow leader of the House. Ironically, it was this appointment that sealed his fate. It was thought that it would be a PR disaster to have someone who had complained that MPs were living on rations speaking on this topic and so Duncan was demoted to be shadow Prisons Minister and Sir George Young moved into his job and speaking slot. I suspect that a proof reader somewhere will be getting an earful

The Tories have been briefing heavily that this would be a policy heavy conference. Indeed, I’m told that every shadow Cabinet member will have at least one substantive announcement to make. But there is relatively little that is genuinely new in the Sunday newspapers. One explanation for this is that the Tories accept that Lisbon is going to crowd out any other story. One senior source told me on Friday that CCHQ thought that nothing other than Europe would have cut through until Sunday afternoon. So far, the Tory containment operation on Europe appears to be just about holding. There is, though, grumbling about Boris’s comments in the Sunday Times

The Observer’s leading article asks the question: will David Cameron’s modernism serve Britain’s interests? The article’s conclusion is a firm ‘no’; its key is that the ‘Conservatives’ apparent relish in tackling the budget deficit is not entirely economic in motivation. It expresses a broader ideological commitment to a smaller state.’ A smaller state is better for Britain. The consistent growth of the state over more than a decade has demolished Britain’s financial strength. In changed economic circumstances, its continued growth is unsustainable. July is a month that should produce a revenue surplus, as tax receipts outweigh borrowing. This year saw a £8.1bn deficit. Nothing expresses the nation’s parlous financial position and the