Supporting Play for Elham

Play for Elham is campaigning to improve the play facilities available for children in the Elham Valley area.

I’ve been happy to led them my support in their appeal for funding for the refurbishment of the King George V playground in Elham. In part out of vested interest, as my young children will benefit from this, as well as many other local families. However, good play and recreational facilities are important to help channel the energy and creativity of young people.

You can find out more about Play for Elham’s plans by following the link above.

Damian Collins candidate’s diary

Damian with Conservative campaigners in Folkestone harbour

My diary for last week was published on Conservativehome.com on Monday, but for those of you who haven’t seen it i’ve reproduced it here.

Monday 11th to Sunday 17th January 2010
　
This week we have been battling with the elements in East Kent, but a week which started with thick snow on the ground across Folkestone and Hythe ended with a warming debate in the BBC South East studios.
The previous weekend we had had heavy snow, which had closed roads and made it difficult to get out. At home in Elham the temperature one morning was as low as minus 6 degrees C, and my daughter Claudia’s snowman was enjoying a longer than expected life in the garden.

Snow disruptions, particularly when they affect the Channel Tunnel, the car and lorry entrance for which is just outside Folkestone, can cause lots of problems. Lorries are ‘Stacked’ on the M20 motorway leading to complete closures between junctions. We have an urgent need for investment in the general road and rail freight infrastructure around the Tunnel and also the Port of Dover.

However, the bad weather hadn’t been enough to deter the contestants for the annual Romney Marsh Sloe Gin Competition at the Ship Inn in Dymchurch. I had been asked once more to join the panel of judges and on a blind tasting. The winners cup went again to our local County Councillor, Willie Richardson, and the funds raised from the event went to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) Dungeness appeal.

Willie has also been closely involved with one of the major issues which has recently affected the constituency: the future of Dungeness and the prospects for a new nuclear power station there. The Dungeness ‘B’ power station is due to come to the end of its operating life in 2018 and the site had been on the Government’s shortlist for a new generation station to be built. However, following some questions raised by Natural England on the environmental impact of the new station on the shingle beds that form the Dungeness peninsular, the plan was dropped. This decision is still part of a consultation process that will close on 22nd February and there is considerable local support for a new power station which could create up to 2,000 local jobs. It could also supply more than enough clean energy to power the the whole of Kent.

Michael Howard and I met with EDF on Tuesday, who are the energy company that run the existing power station to discuss their views on the long term future of Dungeness. I also discussed, with the Mayor of Lydd, a public meeting which he is planning to call for the communities that live near the power station. This is due to be held on 13th February at the Guildhall in Lydd.

The snow intervened on Wednesday and this led to the cancellation of a public meeting I was going to attend at Sellindge Village Hall. This was to be a public meeting of the Kent County Council planning committee on the controversial application to build a ’sludge plant’ at Otterpool quarry. The meeting will now be held on Monday 8th February.

On Thursday morning I had a call with Helen Burrows in Ed Vaizey’s office to discuss the next event for the Conservative Arts and Creative Industries Network. I am Director of this new group that we launched in May last year and holds events for people in these industries to meet with each other and members of the Shadow Culture team. Our next event is being hosted by Bonhams on 3rd Ferbruary and will focus on ideas to promote new artisitc talent and creative businesses.

In the afternoon I joined a workshop on environmental and climate change policy, which was being run by the Green Alliance think tank for a group of my fellow Conservative candidates. We had the chance to discuss a broad range of issues linked to climate change and energy policy, from fuel poverty, to flood relief and energy security. Given that in my own constituency we have a nuclear power station, large onshore wind farm and also the Romney Marshes, much of which lie below sea level, these were all particularly relevant issues. In the evening we were joined by Greg Clark, the Shadow Secretary for Energy and Climate Change, to discuss these issues over dinner.

On Friday I had a series of meeting across the constituency. This started off in Sandgate with a discussion with Trevor Minter at the Folkestone Harbour Company about regeneration plans for that area of Folkestone. I then met with Ann Berry who is the Vice Chairman of the Step Short project, of which I am Chairman. ‘Step Short’ is a project focused on regeneration the Road of Remembrance in Folkestone, which was the road down which millions of men marched during the First World War to and from the boats that carried them to France and the front line trenches. The project’s aims are to create a new memorial along the road that will tell its story and that of the role played by Folkestone during the war, and also to provide information resources for visitors. We want to complete this work in time for marking the centenary of the outbreak of the War, in July 2014.
　
The meeting was followed by a quick working lunch with my agent Gordon Williams (who, thanks to his psychic training, called me as I was typing this bit). In the afternoon I met with Briony Kapoor in New Romney to discuss the work of some of the leading local arts groups and societies, and how our policies might support them. Later, early that evening I met with Arnie Sanyal and Mustafiz Khandaker, at Mustafiz’s business in New Romney, the Curry Lounge. As well as some serious discussion on issues that are affecting the local business community, we also sampled some of their excellent food.

On Saturday morning we braved the cold and driving rain for a canvassing session in the Harbour ward in Folkestone. Despite the weather we had a warm reception on the doorsteps and afterwards pick up some scallops from the fish market. My wife Sarah and I took our children Claudia and Hugo over to see my parents in Tenterden later in the afternoon. Claudia is three on Monday (18th January), so amid much excitement and mess there was a very serious cup cake making session with Granny to look forward to.

On Sunday I had agreed to take part in a live discussion on the Politics Show South East with a Labour and Lib Dem candidate from Kent. This was recorded over at their studio in Tunbridge Wells. It was also good to see Alex Deane there from the ‘Big Brother Watch’ campaign who was also taking part in an earlier slot on the programme. Following the programme I joined the rest of the family at my parents in Tenterden for Sunday lunch followed by an early, birthday eve tea for Claudia.

New approach required to stop the ‘Stack Attack’

Damian inside the Channel Tunnel with representatives of Kent County Council and Eurotunnel

The first real cold snap of the winter has brought with it the sadly typical traffic chaos. The major disruptions were caused by the closure of the Channel Tunnel and made worse by the cold and icy driving conditions. Operation Stack was enforced, and lorries were parked on the M20 and along the A20. Eurostar passengers suffered the misery of sitting for hours on trains that had either failed or were held up. This is bad at any time but before Christmas when people are travelling to be with friends and family, this is even worse.

Personally, from what I saw driving around the area at the weekend, I thought the Kent Highways Agency and Police did a good job in gritting the roads and trying to keep the traffic moving, but these were obviously difficult circumstances.

The big question is how we can mitigate against the conditions that lead to the gridlock of our roads when the Channel Tunnel or Port of Dover are closed, due to bad weather in the winter months, or strike action.

There has been much discussion about where we can put the lorries instead of stacking them on the motorway, junctions, roundabouts, lay-bys, country lanes, or anywhere else for that matter. The County Council has favoured the construction of new lorry parks, including a site off of the M20 near Sellindge and Aldington. I do not have a problem with lorry parks in themselves, the big questions though are who pays for them and where they go. The Channel Tunnel and the road infrastructure around it is a major piece of national and international infrastructure, so there should be an, at least, national plan to support them. This means that the Government should be prepared to support the building of new lorry parks, also that they should not necessarily be sited next to the Tunnel or Port of Dover.

More could be done to give lorries the option of leaving the motorway earlier to park up before they get caught up in the congestion of Operation Stack. We could have a network of lorry parks starting nearer to London rather than concentrating them in south east Kent. My concern about the Sellindge lorry park plan is that this becomes part of a creeping industrialisation along the M20 corridor from Ashford which would be totally out of keeping with the area, and make further development of this kind more likely.

I also believe that foreign road hauliers should be made to make some contribution to the maintenance of the road network and support services that they use here. UK hauliers will pay through UK taxes and fuel duty when they fill up their tanks here. Many of the international hauliers will fill up in Luxembourg where fuel tax is very low, and be able to complete their tour of the UK without needing to take on any more fuel. There are a number of schemes being considered, including making all hauliers sign up to a road disc scheme, the cost of which could only be reclaimed if they paid tax on fuel bought in the UK. I believe, despite the objections of some and the intransigence of the Government, that this is a problem that can be solved.

We also need to look at investment in our road infrastructure in Kent as a whole. The demand for road traffic, particularly from lorries is only likely to grow, and already we can see that the current set up is so fragile that as soon as something goes wrong, the whole system can collapse. The Government should have developed plans to complete the A2 dual carriageway to Dover and also consider plans for an additional crossing across the Thames Estuary. We should equally be looking at how the Channel Tunnel can be used to bring more freight by rail into the UK. The Tunnel is currently only operating at 25% of its potential capacity, so there would presumably be scope for more rail freight that could keep more lorries off of Kent roads.

Overall, if we want to see the delays of this past weekend become an exception rather than a frequent winter event, we need to plan for a substantial long term solution. Without this, the odd lorry park here or there will be little more than an expensive piece of sticking plaster. We will also require bold and imaginative polices to plan for this at a time when the pressures on Government spending have never been greater. This investment is something that the Government should have planned in the good times, knowing how important it would be to our future prosperity. They failed to do this, and we are all paying the price for it.

Finally I thought it was interesting to note that the Government has recently announced that it is considering selling off assets like the high speed rail link, its shares in the Channel Tunnel, and the Port of Dover. There is no promise that any of this money will be ring fenced to invest in the local transport infrastructure. So in the Government’s mind when these pieces of infrastructure are working well they are considered national assets, belonging to the whole country, but when they create problems for the local communities who live alongside them, the Government considers it to be a local problem.

This article was first published by the Romney Marsh Times

Damian welcomes Jeremy Hunt to Folkestone’s Creative Quarter

Yesterday I invited the Shadow Culture Media and Sport Secretary of State, Jeremy Hunt, to visit the Creative Quarter and Creative Foundation in Folkestone.

We were given a tour by the Foundation’s Artistic Director, Nick Ewbank, and Trevor Minter from the Folkestone Harbour Company. This included visiting Shane Record’s gallery in the Old High Street, which is pictured above, the University Centre, The Quarterhouse and Screen South in Tontine Street. We also met with Roger De Haan to discuss the Foundation’s work.

Culture and creative industries are at the heart of Folkestone’s revival. The Creative Foundation has given opportunities to new creative talent and businesses and I wanted Jeremy Hunt to see this work first hand so that it is top of his mind when leading Conservative policy in this area.

The digital and creative economy, covering everything from web designers, film makers, artists and writers is an increasingly important part of the economy as a whole. But to flourish, creative businesses often need to work together and develop a creative community, which is what makes Folkestone such an exciting place to be at the moment.

Should today be a public holiday?

Earlier in the year I raised the idea of making 11th November a public holiday as a memorial to the sacrifices in war of all service personnel.

Following that article hundreds of people have expressed there support for the idea. Nearly 400 people joined the support group on Facebook and over 200 people voted in an online poll conducted by the Hawkinge Gazette – with well over 80% voting in favour.

This would be a particularly significant time to consider such a mark of respect, with the funeral earlier in the year of Harry Patch, the last living link we had to World War One. As many of you will know I am also Chairman of the Step Short campaign group which is campaigning to restore the Road of Remembrance in Folkestone as a memorial to the hundreds of thousands of men who left for the trenches from the town’s harbour. On 4th October we held a memorial march along the Leas and down the Road of Remembrance which was supported by over 300 people, including veterans. This is pictured at the top of this post.

As part of my consultation as to whether we should promote the idea of 11th November becoming a public holiday we have discussed the question whether this should be a new holiday or whether we should move one of the holidays earlier in the year. The first preference was a for a new holiday and the second favourite would be to move one of the two May bank holidays.

For some time now there has been much speculation about whether we should have an additional public holiday in Britain, and also how we should mark the passing of the last of the veterans of the trenches of the First World War. By making 11th November a public holiday we can address both of these questions. Of course in other Commonwealth countries like Australia and New Zealand, the idea of a public holiday to honour the war dead has been in place for many years. Both these countries mark ANZAC day on 25th April, the anniversary of the first day of the Gallipoli landings during the First World War, where so many soldiers from Australia and New Zealand lost their lives.

The future of Dungeness is in doubt

Damian Collins at Dungeness B power station

Today the Government has produced a short list of ten sites that would be suitable for new nuclear power stations, but excluded Dungeness from that list.

A new nuclear power station at Dungeness could create up to 1000 jobs and be a considerable boost to the local economy for years. We need to understand more about this decision and what hope there is for the future of Dungeness.

It has been reported that concerns about flood risk and the local eco system have been cited against using Dungeness, but are these any different from the situation regarding the existing power station which has been in safe operation for many years.

I have stated before that I would like to see a new power station at Dungeness, subject to it satisfying environmental and safety requirements. Also, because the Government has delayed making a decision about the future of energy generation in the UK, new build nuclear power stations have become necessary if we are to meet the demand for electricity as aging plants close down over the next 10 years. There is already a real danger of increased levels of power cuts and the UK becoming too reliant on imported energy.

As it stands in Kent, by 2018 we will lose Dungeness which generates half our electricity and probably have to buy nuclear energy generated from French power stations just 30 or 40 miles away.

Manchester monuments and the brave new world

I have written an article for Crossbow magazine which has been published at the Conservative Party conference by the Bow Group.

I’ve included the text of the article below.

At the base of a cross in the former St John’s churchyard in central Manchester lies the small memorial of a man who arguably helped to create the modern game of football and the sporting world. Yet he was not a sportsman or administrator but instead a campaigner in local government. William Marsden, the memorial records, was the man who ‘originated the Saturday half holiday’ that for the first time gave Manchester mill workers the chance to enjoy leisure time. This act by Marsden in the early 1840s was an early blow in a movement that ultimately meant working people could devote time to the pursuits that had previously been the preserve of the gentry. Without the Saturday half holiday, working men would not have had the chance to eat and change before kicking off a football match at 3pm. Spectators would not have had the time to watch these games being played.

Many people believed that workers would not use their spare time constructively, but would instead spend it drinking and loafing around. Instead of this many joined the works football teams were created, like the railwaymen from Newton Heath who formed the club that went on to become Manchester United. The Saturday half holiday also gave birth to other clubs and associations for sports like cricket and athletics, and created the demand for recreational parks in the towns and cities.

All of this evolved over time and was driven by local initiative. There was no Government plan for the creation of sports clubs, national targets for the number of balls to be hit every week or pathfinder funding for facilities. People like William Marsden believed that just by giving people time and opportunity they could create something worthwhile.

The monuments of the Victorian age, great and small, mark endeavour, heroism and invention. Out of that age stretched an arc of progress into the modern world where through access to education, leisure and better housing more opportunity was extended to more people in our society. In the period of my childhood, during the years of Margaret Thatcher’s government, we saw that opportunity extended further through popularising home ownership and giving individual workers greater freedoms in the face of union power.

I recently attended an event organised by Republicans Abroad where former White House Press Secretary Dana Perrino asked people to recall when it was that realised that they were a Conservative. For me it was born in that time, seeing Conservatism closely allied to those who had aspiration and desired opportunity. What always appalled me about communism was the way is sort to strangle the human spirit and deny people the opportunity to follow their talents and enjoy the rewards that could come their way through their work.

So when we look again at the monuments of that Victorian age, and the ages of aspiration and progress that followed, you ask yourself what the monuments will be to the brave new world we find ourselves in today.

In Aldous Huxley’s famous book, the brave new world was ordered into a series of highly controlled social strata. The only way you could join the Alpha group, was to be born into it. If you were in the bottom tier, you stayed their all your life. People in the alpha tier worked harder but also enjoyed better health and physical appearance. People in the middle tiers were told to be happy, rather like Ronnie Barker, that they still had people they could look down on, and could enjoy not having to work as hard as the Alphas.

Whilst such a world remains within the realm of science fiction, we should be alarmed that social mobility and progress is declining in our country – at a time when no Government has ever spent more on policies it has claimed will achieve the opposite result. The monument to Gordon Brown’s Labour Government should be built to mark the growing inability of people to escape poverty and the decline in academic achievement of students from poorer backgrounds. A recent study has shown that in the UK, more than other developed countries, there is the greatest correlation between students test scores at the age of 13 and the social profile of their families.

We also have the growing problem of worklessness; a growing culture where in some communities work has become an option rather than a real requirement and millions of people have been condemned to a life living on benefits. As was recently reported, the latest census information shows that two million working age people in Britain have never worked. In some of our most deprived communities the level or worklessness even before the recession was over 40%. ‘O brave new world that has such people in it.’

There will be no quick fix to these problems, but we must ensure that at the heart of our policies progress, aspiration and opportunity are working to deliver a better society for all.

Speaking at fringe event on low carbon economy at 7.30pm

I’ve been invited to speak at a fringe event at the Conservative Party conference in Manchester at 7.30pm this evening. The event will debate the steps being taken by businesses to reduce their carbon emissions and the role that Government can play helping them.

You can find the details of this event below. If you are in Manchester it would be great to see you there.

Tuesday 6 October, 7:30pm
Location: DODS Marquee 2, Manchester Centre

Organisations: DODS – The House Magazine and ePolitix.com in partnership with the IET and CMI

About the partner organisation:
The Institution of Engineering and Technology is one of the world’s leading professional societies for the engineering and technology community. The IET has more than 150,000 members in 127 countries and offices in Europe, North America and Asia-Pacific. The IET provides a global knowledge network to facilitate the exchange of ideas and promote the positive role of science, engineering and technology in the world.

Chair:
Hugh Morgan Williams, Chairman, The Northern Way

Speakers:

Damian Collins, Prospective Parliamentary Candidate, Folkestone and Hythe
Nigel Fine, IET: Chief Executive
Anna Pretious, North Wales police: Environment and Energy Conservation Manager
Petra Wilton, Director of Policy and Research, CMI

The event will address the role of Government in helping businesses and public sector organisations cut their emissions over the coming decade:

What level of Government intervention is required to achieve the urgent change that we need?

How can we maximise the benefits to the economy?

Should we place different pressures on large businesses than small businesses?

What are the best incentives we can offer businesses to aim towards a low carbon future?

The business and public sectors account for around one-third of UK greenhouse gas emissions. According to the Carbon Trust, existing technological and energy efficiency measures can be used to deliver carbon abatement on a cost effective basis, to reduce emissions by 2020 by at least 20 per cent in non-domestic buildings-related energy use.

Giving politics the X factor

Conservative candidates for the 2010 elections

I have written an article for ‘Forward’ magazine which is published today by the Conservative Way Forward group. You can read the text of the article below. The picture, above, included with this post, is the picture that was taken for the front cover of the magazine. The people featured are’ left to right, Louise Bagshawe, Stephen Greenhalgh, Damian Collins, Harriett Baldwin, Charlie Elphicke, Conor Burns, Michelle Tempest and Stephen Metcalfe

Giving Politics the X factor

If a general election is democracy’s equivalent of a five course meal, then the X factor is its box of Quality Street. Instead of the weighty decision of which party will sustain you over the course of a whole parliament, you can just choose from any one of numerous small and brightly wrapped packages. If you make the wrong choice, it doesn’t matter; just take another next time.

The appeal of shows like the X factor is clear: it combines entertainment with empowerment. For a couple of hours every Saturday you are a touch of a button away from making a decision that will affect someone else’s life. Like a latter day Emperor at the Roman games you choose who has entertained you enough to warrant a stay of execution for a further week. You decide. You vote. You see the result. If only, they say, our politics was more like this, and perhaps if it was more people would get involved.

In the middle of an economic recession we have a political depression fuelled by the MP’s expenses scandal and the impotence of a dying Labour Government. Voter turn out in elections has been in decline since the 1992 general election and the votes cast for the main parties have been steadily falling, with more support going to smaller single issue groups and the nationalists. Some say that there are two answers to these problems: more local referendums on single issues and changing the way we elect Members of Parliament so that more weight is given to minority opinions. Both these changes, the advocates tell us, would give people more of a voice in our politics and allow a greater breadth of opinions to be heard.

Go back to the X factor and it’s worth remembering that the element of democracy is, in fact, a complete illusion. The Judges control the order of the performances, the songs sung, and give live opinions that are supposed to influence the views of the audience. They have the power to ensure that the people they want to survive on the show can, and the vote is just there to ask the pubic to endorse their views. Just in case the voters place the wrong act last, in some shows the Judges often reserve the right to eliminate the next least popular act instead. This is why it is very rare for someone to win, who the Judges want to get rid of. When this did happen with John Sergeant, on the BBC’s ‘Strictly Come Dancing’, a huge PR offensive was launched against him that effectively hounded him off the programme. If phone-in talent shows were really an exercise in democracy, we would have the power to vote off the Judges.

This has always been at the heart of my concerns to the idea of introducing more referendums, because there is more to being a democracy than holding votes. On really big constitutional issues like whether or not Britain should join the euro, referendums give the public a clear say on binding and important long term decisions. However, local referendums on administrative issues like tax rates, policing priorities or a property development reduce the public interest to taking snap decisions on single issues, rather than looking at the whole picture of how they are governed. In such referendums it is likely that most times people will vote against tax increases, for extra spending and against development; which would also be presented as the best pain-free option in each case. Also people are not necessarily being asked to balance competing priorities or consider how the result of the referendum can be delivered without implications for other areas of local services.

The failure of the G20 protestors in London in April 2009 to present any kind of coherent message for change was a result of this kind of an approach to politics. Different groups adopted single issues, many of which were contradictory to each other; like campaigning for measures to mitigate climate change and against plans to build centres to create renewable energy.

The key to our democracy then is not just the power to chose who governs us, but the power to remove them if we think they have done a bad job. The more policy is imposed through referendums, the weaker politically government at all levels will become and the harder it will be for voters to exercise their judgement over its performance.

However, in keeping more responsibility in the hands of the elected politicians we should also insist that they take back more of the powers they have willingly given away. When Sir Ian Blair resigned as the Commissioner of the London Metropolitan police he explained that he had taken the decision because he had lost the confidence of Boris Johnson, who is both Mayor of London and Chairman of its Police Authority. The Home Secretary’s response was to condemn this political interference into the running of the police by the Mayor. But surely Londoners would expect that if the Mayor didn’t think its police force was being well run that he should speak out; that’s what he is there for. Under this current Labour Government, Minister’s seem more than happy to hide behind conventions and procedures and explain that a controversial issue is not something that it would be proper for them to comment on or get involved with. In terms of limiting political interference with the police, clearly we would expect that this means that Ministers do not misdirect police resources for their own political motives, not that they are forbidden from taking any public view on its actions.

But it is not just policing where we see this problem in action. You will often hear Ministers claim that they are taking a decision based on the science, or that they are ‘following the science’ in some emerging issue. That’s fine in itself, but a sound scientific report to support the licensing of some new treatment, procedure, or chemical should just be a basic requirement rather than an end in itself. If all Ministers did was sign off on approved scientific reports we could just leave the job of Government to the Civil Service.

This attitude has also infected people in local government. I was recently at a meeting in my constituency when a Lib Dem councillor spoke out against the Leader of Kent County Council because he had said that he was in favour of local development project. But his objection was not because he disagreed with the development, but because he thought it was wrong that the County Council leader should have expressed a view publicly that was contrary to the advice of the council officers and which might also influence others. What is the point of having Council leaders if they are not prepared to demonstrate this leadership in the way that Paul Carter did in Kent?

However, if we want politicians to keep power and responsibility we need to preserve an electoral system that maintains the personal link between Members of Parliament and their local constituents and also produces, in the main, Governments with a working majority of seats in the House of Commons. Voting in politics should be seen as the positive affirmation of a point of view. MPs should be elected because they received the most positive votes, not because of a combination of positive votes and second and third choice preferences. Governments should ideally be formed on the basis of a manifesto on which they stood for election, rather than the back room deals they have done in the process of trying to put together a coalition.

The response to the political crisis we have faced this year and largely been by critics to decrease the power and accountability politicians and the House of Commons. They would have less to do, fewer decisions to make, and in turn be less necessary. Our democracy would indeed be given the X factor, controlled by a few Judges and with politicians limited to the role of the studio audience, largely impotent but allowed to boo and cheer every now and again.

When John F Kennedy accepted the nomination of the Democratic Party to run for President in 1960 he said that ‘we cannot have faith in the future unless we have faith in ourselves.’ This, too, should be the mantra for people entering politics today, and for everyone who votes for them. If there are changes to be made to our political system it should be to role back the power of non-elected bodies, to make ministers take responsibility for their actions and to foster a culture of healthy debate and enquiry to give greater scrutiny of decisions.

Conservative conference preview

I have been asked by the Social Market Foundation think tank to write a preview article for their newsletter on the Conservative Party conference. You can read this article below and see the whole newletter on the Social Market Foundation’s website – http://www.smf.co.uk/assets/files/Conference%20newsletter%202009%20FINAL.pdf

Looking ahead to the Conservative Party Conference – Manchester 2009

Whatever happens over the next year, we know that this will be the last Conservative conference before the general election. An eve of election conference has a special atmosphere, and we can expect that in Manchester, which will be the biggest in Conservative conference in modern times. However, the sense of anticipation in the air will not come from the prospect of an election victory, but instead an understanding of the great responsibility of preparing for Government in the most difficult economic circumstances for generations. This conference will be about what will do, not how we can win.

The Conservatives will use the conference to set out their vision of change for the country, and the part we all have to play in delivering that change. This message won’t only be directed to the candidates and activists in the Manchester Centre, but to everyone, and will be supported not just by the conference speeches and debates, but the publication of further policy papers and statements.

At the heart of David Cameron’s message as Conservative leader has been a renewed sense of national responsibility. Political leaders and Governments are expected to set the course and make the running, but we all have role to play in getting to the destination. So we can expect to hear a lot about our need as a country to live within our means, from Government to businesses, and households. Also how powers can be decentralised from Westminster and Whitehall to councils and individuals, so parents have more control over where their children can go to school, councils more say on housing and planning, and communities more influence over the priorities for local policing.

There will be much focus on David Cameron’s main address on the Thursday of the conference, an event which ever since his barnstorming leadership campaign speech in 2005 has become one of the highlights of the week. In a recent article Ted Sorensen, John F Kennedy’s speechwriter, wrote that, ‘The Presidents greatest in speechcraft are almost all the greatest in statecraft also – because speeches are not just words. They present ideas, directions and values, and the best speeches are those that get that right.’ So that will be the challenge at the end of the conference week, not just to leave the party members in good heart for the election to come, but to leave the country in no doubt that he can deliver the change they are seeking.