It is now inconceivable that David Cameron will go into the next election not offering tax breaks of some description for married couples. The amount at stake here, £20 per week, may be tiny - and certainly isn't enough to justify a couple staying together - but it is a symbolic affirmation of the institution of marriage, and that is what is important.

Of course, David Cameron knows that this plays well with traditional Tory supporters but, equally, he does not want it to be seen as an attack on single parents or unmarried couples.

With that in mind, the fact that he chose to launch his response to the report this afternoon at Kids Club - an inner-city charity providing educational support for vulnerable children and young people - is a clear signal that any proposals that the party do come up with are not intended to harm children whose parents are not married.

Perhaps the biggest significance of today's launch is that it shows Mr Cameron moving to a new phase of his leadership. He campaigned for the job under the slogan 'modern compassionate Conservatism'. For the first two years he has stressed the first two words of that soundbite at the expense of the third.

The grammar school row was a sign of how far he had stretched the patience of grassroots supporters with the so-called 'change strategy'. An uncompromising statement in praise of marriage silences those who claim Mr Cameron "is not really a Tory".

The Tory leader would say that it is precisely due to his efforts that the Conservatives are now able to tackle these hard-hitting social problems that Britain faces without simply being stigmatised as the hard-nosed moralising Tories of old.

Complete with its new image, he feels that the Tory party can now be looked at as trying to find constructive solutions to social problems on a level with the rest of society, which is crucial when it comes to its prospects of winning the next election.

There are, of course, still fundamental problems. The fact that this entire 600-page report decided not to tackle the issue of civil partnerships, and the rights of gay couples, is significant. Clearly, this is a deliberate omission, designed to avoid taking on a subject which has always caused huge controversy.

It does, however, appear extremely unlikely that civil partnerships would be left out of tax breaks afforded to married couples. Iain Duncan Smith, who is to the right of David Cameron, accepts that civil partnerships are here to stay, and Cameron is very unlikely to exclude them.

Times Recommends

• Fern Britton: 'I still can't see that I was wrong'
• Extreme cooking
• Easy French: Tarte Tatin