Read David Cameron's speech notes

David Cameron was never going to be able to change the public’s long-established doubts about the Conservative Party by one speech and four days in Blackpool. Nor did he.

His goals were more limited: to raise Tory morale (where he has clearly succeeded) and to raise questions in Gordon Brown's team about the wisdom of going for an early election (which we will know by early next week).

The Conservatives are in two minds about an early election. In one sense, they do not want one, since every spokesman and MP to whom I spoke accepted that the party could not win outright and almost certainly could not become the largest single party.

However, the “bring it on” attitude of Mr Cameron is not just empty bravado. Many Tory MPs think, rightly, that a November election could backfire on Gordon Brown. He could end up either with a hung Parliament, or almost as bad, a majority of only about 20 to 25. His gamble would then be seen to have failed. It could be the mirror image of 1992 when the Tories were well ahead of Labour in share of the vote (by 42 to 35 per cent), but won a majority of only 21. The Brown honeymoon would be over, and the Tories would feel they were on the way back.

The Blackpool conference will be measured in the short term by its impact on the Labour and Tory shares of the vote. The Tories hope to rise above their recent 32 to 34 per cent, with Labour slipping below its plus40 per cent of the past fortnight. There should be at least some movement merely because of all the favourable publicity given to the Tories.

But the party’s problems are much deeper than can be corrected by a small shift in voting intentions. As Populus and other polls have shown, a clear majority of the public thinks Mr Brown is more prime ministerial and stronger than Mr Cameron, and they are not sure what the Tories would do in office. Most voters also do not think Mr Cameron cares about the problems ordinary people face, or has answers to the big problems facing Britain.

The Tories have tried to address these weaknesses with their myriad policy proposals this week: in particular, George Osborne’s tax package and his hints of more to come. That may, and should, help, provided the Tories could see off the Labour counter-attacks about affordability and responsibility.

However, there were many similarities with Labour’s conference last week: lots of populist measures but little sense of an overall strategy. In that respect, if no other, Mr Cameron’s speech had the same flaws as Mr Brown’s. This does not mean that Tory and Labour approaches are the same. They are not. Their values, and instincts about the role of the state, differ. But the message is often cloudy. How is it possible to limit the size of the state, and public spending, if most district general hospitals, and local accident departments, are to be kept open, and the squeeze on the defence budget reversed?

Similarly, “trust the professionals” cannot always be reconciled with stronger accountability and extending choice and diversity.

The Tories have made a start and have reacted rapidly to the challenge of an early election. But they are primarily engaged in damage limitation for themselves and a spoiling operation on Labour. They are not yet really preparing for government.

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