Cameron: E or S?

Often at university the notices for a particular lecture would be marked in pencil by students who had gone through it the previous year as 'S' for soporific or, far worse, 'E' for emetic. I try to listen to the party leaders' speeches at their annual conferences (Warning: this cannot be done without alcohol) and I am afraid that David Cameron's speech to the faithful scored, for the first twenty minutes at least, a giant E.

There was the usual tripe about our boys in Afghanistan, an appalling bit on his feelings when he pinned a medal on a disabled athlete, and tales of his own disabled father and his late disabled son. Ghastly.

After a while, though, some scintilla of coherence managed to make its way through. He recognised the threat to our economic future posed by newly developed countries, the threat to the European continent of a massive self-congratulatory welfare state. Britain is to be a country where children receive a good educational start in life and where enterprise and work are rewarded. He did not explain why the Job Seekers' Allowance (unemployment benefit to you and me) has risen faster than average earnings while he has been Prime Minister.

But there were fleeting impressions that Cameron had some idea of where he wanted to go.

Let's hope so.