In other circumstances the first conference party leader's speech in the wake of a majority-winning election is something of a victory rally, a chairing of the triumphant leader ... "may he rule for ever!". But the Tories had been put on notice before the May election that Prime Minister David Cameron would not be fighting yet another, third term. And, inevitably, the conference in Birmingham this week, has become, a beauty contest for the putative successors. The prime minister eclipsed himself.
Cameron name-checked the main contenders yesterday in his speech – "Iron chancellor" George Osborne, Justice Secretary Michael Gove, "the great Conservative reformer", and London mayor Boris Johnson, who earned a standing ovation. A passing reference to Home Secretary Teresa May – blink and you missed it – was a clear snub to a contender who the day before had played the immigration scare card in what many saw as a cynical populist play for the party's right. Even business leaders rebuked her irresponsibility.
Predictably Cameron also went for the new Labour leader no holds barred: “We cannot let that man inflict his security-threatening, terrorist-sympathising, Britain-hating ideology on the country we love.” Vintage Tory conference tub-thumping, but not altogether at one with his more reasoned attempts also to sell the “modern, compassionate, One Nation Conservative Party”, “the party of working people, the party for working people – today, tomorrow, always.”
“A Greater Britain doesn’t just need a stronger economy, it needs a stronger society,” the new champion of social democracy insisted , citing equality, poverty, opportunity, housing, and extremism as the challenges of our time. Whether they are in the tin when you open it, is another matter.
On Europe Cameron left us no wiser about his negotiating intentions or demands, promising, to applause, only never to sign up to the EU’s stated goal of “ever closer union” – too late, it’s in the Treaty of Rome. He personally favours Britain staying in a reformed EU, but would “not be heartbroken” to leave.