05/10/2011 Today at Conference

Welcome to our final round up of the Conservative Party conference,

here in Manchester, indeed our final round up of the party season

2011. One year ago, David Cameron told the Conservative conference

that the British economy was out of the dangers are. Today, in the run-

up to his speech, we learnt that economic growth had slowed to zero,

that the recession was deeper than we had thought, and that the

eurozone crisis had just entered an even more dangerous phase. Mr

Cameron made his speech against the backdrop of the grimmest economic

outlook since the IMF bailed out of this country in the mid- 1970s.

Here are the highlights. I do not underestimate how worried people

feel. But the truth is, the Government now, we need to be

energised, not paralysed by gloom and fear. Half the world is booming.

Let's go and say to them, so many of our communities are thriving.

There is so much that is great about our country, so let us reject

the pessimism, let us and bring on the can-do optimism, and fight for

a better future for our country, Now, of course, that starts with

our economy. As we meet here in Manchester, the threat to the world

economy, and to Britain, is as serious as in 2008, when world

recession loomed. The eurozone is in crisis, the French and German

economies have slowed to a standstill. Even mighty America is

questioned about her debts. It is an anxious time. Prices and bills

keep going up - petrol, electricity, the weekly shop. On the news it is

job losses, cutbacks, closures. You think about tuition fees, house

prices, the cost of a deposit, you wonder how our children will manage.

Of course, government can help, and this one is. The answer is

straightforward but uncomfortable. This was not a normal recession, it

was a debt crisis. It was caused by too much borrowing, by individuals,

banks, businesses, and most of all, by governments. The only way out of

a debt crisis is to deal with your debts. That's why households are

peeing down the credit card and the store card bills. It means banks

getting the books in order, and it means governments all over the

world cutting spending and living within their means. Our whole

deficit reduction programme is really just one big bail-out of the

last Labour government. We have been subjected to a kind of

national apology Tour by Labour these last few months. Sorry for

sucking up to Gaddafi, for not regulating the banks, for crushing

civil liberties, for failing to go green, for not building enough

houses. But nothing, not a peep, on the thing they really need to say

sorry for, wasting billions and billions of your money. No apology

Do you know what the shadow Chancellor said last week? That

Labour did not spend any more money than they had available. Ed - use

spent �428 billion more than you had available. And there is only

one conclusion you can draw from this - we must never ever let these

people anywhere near a our economy ever again. So, to the unions

planning to strike over public sector pensions, I say this - you

have a very right to protest, but our population is ageing, our

public sector pension system is unaffordable, the only way to give

public sector workers a decent, sustainable pension system, which I

want to, and to do right by the taxpayer, is to ask public servants

to work a little longer and to pay a little more. That is fair. What

is not fair, what is not right, is going on strike and hitting the

very people that are helping to pay for your future pension. There is

too much can't-do sogginess around. We cannot go on with the rigid,

outdated employment legislation of the past. I know that people will

say, what about workers' rights? We must not forget the most important

right of all, the right to have a This government is providing

funding for an extra 250,000 apprenticeships across this

Parliament. But we're not getting enough back from big business. So,

here is a direct appeal - if you want skilled employees, we will

provide the funding, we will cut the red tape, but you have got to

show the leadership and give us the apprenticeships this country so

Our businesses need the space to grow, literally. And that is one of

the reasons we are reforming our planning system. It is hard to

blame local people for opposing developments, when they get so few

benefits. We are changing that. I know people are worried about what

this means for conservation. Let me tell you, I love our countryside, I

would never do anything to put it at risk. But we have got to get the

balance right. To those who oppose everything we do, my message is

this - take your arguments down to the JobCentre, because we're going

to get Britain back to work. In Britain today, we do have a group

of schools which are utterly intolerant of failure, where 90% of

pupils get five good GCSEs. Yes, private schools. You have heard me

talk about social responsibility. I want to see private schools and

academies in the state system. Wellington College does it, Dulwich

does it, others can, too. The apartheid between private and state

education is one of the biggest wasted opportunities in our country

today. Let it be us, the Conservative Party, who help to

I am incredibly fortunate in leading his party -- leading his

party. I have had incredible support from all of our previous

leaders. In this party, we do not boo our leaders. We are proud of

what they have done for our party and for our country. A few months

ago, we were all shocked by the scenes on the streets in London and

in other parts of the country. But perhaps almost the most shocking

thing is that people were not that surprised. There was no great call

for a public inquiry to find out what had gone wrong. Instead, I

think you could hear the angry, insistent, overwhelming cry of the

country shouting to its leaders - we know. One of the things that

people want his speedy justice. After the riots, those responsible

were put straight into court, and tough sentences were quickly handed

out. I have made it clear to the police, the prosecution services,

the Ministry of Justice, that if we can do that then, let us do it all

But we all know that the problems go deeper. That is why my driving

ambition in politics is to build that bigger, stronger society. I

stood before a Conservative conference once, and I said it

should not matter whether commitment was between a man and a

woman, or a man and a man, or a woman and a woman. You applauded me.

Five years on, we are consulting on legalising gay marriage. To anyone

who has reservations, I say this - yes, it is about equality, but it

is also about something else, commitment. Conservatives believe

in the ties that bind us, that society is stronger when we make

vows to each other and we support each other. I do not support gay

marriage in spite of being a Conservative, a support gay

marriage because I am are Conservative. -- I am a

Conservative. Next year we're going to welcome the world for the

Olympics and for the Queen's diamond Jubilee. These two events

so a lot about Britain - tradition and maternity all-in-one. Today, we

can choose to be a country that back on its feet and striding

forward, playing down our debt and earning a living, getting people

off welfare and into work, breaking new ground in education with

excellence for Everyone. Britain never had the biggest population,

the largest land mass, the richest resources, but we had the spirit.

It is not the size of the dog in the fight, it is the size of the

fight in the dock. Overcoming the challenge, reinventing ourselves,

confounding the sceptics! That is what we do. It is called leadership.

Let this time of challenge be turned into a time of opportunity.

Not sitting around watching things happen and wondering again, but

standing up, making things happen, and asking, why not? We have the

ideas, we have the people, and now we have a government which is

freeing those people, backing those ideas. Let us show the world some

fight, let us pull together and Most commentators did not regard it

as his finest conference speech, and many were surprised that he did

not dwell more on the precarious international financial situation,

which could turn out to be even more serious than the financial

meltdown of 2008. Perhaps the speech can best be summed up by the

old wartime slogan, keep calm and carry on. I spoke to the Foreign

Secretary, William Hague, after the speech and suggested to him that

Britain really was back in the I don't think it would be fair to

say that. The triple A credit rating was maintained when other

countries were being reduced. I think it is fair to say that the

global economic danger zone has been enlarged, if you like, but it

would be the wrong attitude to say we are back in the danger zone, and

the economy has been growing. defect is a disorderly default in

Greece -- but if there is a disorderly defaulting Greece and

there are no measures put in to stop the contagion, we will be

swept up in that. Virtually the entire western world would be

affected, very seriously. I often use the analogy of the Belding

building with no exit the we have to support the quenching of the

fire. George Osborne was there at the finance ministers' meeting in

Luxembourg last week and was producing some of the ideas as well

as urging them before the G20 summit to take the necessary action.

Of course it involves a recapitalising the banks and making

sure the euro-zone country work more closely together. The if there

is a burning building with no exits, had you put the fire out? You have

to use all your resources. How do you getting? That may be taking the

matter for a bit far. It is your metaphor. The serious point is

there is no clear exit. The Eurozone is a symptom of a wider

problem of debt and deficit in Western nations because the

Eurozone is not well designed it really shows the pressure. It

applies in the United States as well. It applies in this country

where the deficits have been too great and we are dealing with that

and we have seen the Prime Minister, the man who gives the necessary

leadership. But she cannot give the leadership to the Eurozone. We are

not part of it. Unlike the banking crisis in 2008 where because of

London's position we were a central part of this we are now spectators

or, at best, sensible critics from the sidelines. Hopefully we are

sensible critics. We are a bit more than spectators. It does involve us

and because we are one of the principal players in subscribing to

the International Monetary Fund... However when the IMF takes action,

Britain is part of it. We have increased our subscription

accordingly, so we are more than spectators. And as a big player in

the financial world I think what the Chancellor of Britain says he's

taken seriously. The throughout the conference people have told us

although growth is anaemic, growth has carried on, but that has turned

out not to be true. It is true the growth figures have changed. There

has been no growth. Over the last year the economy has grown. So when

ministers have told us the economy has growing, it turned out with

revision they were wrong. This economy is not growing. We don't

have the figures for now, of course. We have them for the nine months

until the summer. Do we expect things to be growing? I am not

going to forecast economic figures. Over the last year the economy has

not grown. It has not grown since the end of the third quarter of

last year. The figures have been revised but they're still has been

growth in the economy. Of course we won the economy to grow more

strongly and that is what so many of these measures are about. You

look at the housing figures and the announcement the Prime Minister

referred to, 200,000 more homes, but 400,000 new jobs. These are the

sort of announcement necessary to help growth, which is of causes low

or anaemic, whatever expression you want to use. It is zero at the

moment. We will see what the figures show when it comes to this

quarter. Why does the government says we should pay down credit card

debt and household debt when the government is adding half a

trillion pounds to its own debt? One of the things we are doing is

bringing government debt under control. It is going up because of

the inheritance we have. I think everyone agrees that what George

Osborne has announced in the Budget brings down the government deficit.

But debt is heading for almost 1.5 trillion. So wide you get tomorrow

-- borrow more and we have to pay off our credit cards? There are two

points in this. We are saving �85 billion over four years from

government spending so the stock of debt will not go over as quickly

over previous plans. The deficits are bring board down. We are not

telling people what to do with their credit cards. People have

been paying down a credit card bills. And an economy that is

vulnerable to high levels of debt, the bank level, the government

level, that is vulnerable in this situation. A subdued conference?

Are you a bit worried? I think this was a confident conference. The

fact we have had the biggest argument over CHC is a successful

conference. Realistic, but optimistic. Realistic but an

optimistic speech from the Prime Minister. We might be fighting the

quick -- economic equivalent of war, but we are still fighting real wars

in Afghanistan and Libya. So up popped the Defence Secretary Liam

Fox to explain away the defence cuts which so annoyed his party

faithful. This is a flavour of what he had to say. Not a day passes

without me thinking how lucky I am to work with the men and women in

uniform, or how humble die down by the great responsibility. That is

why I am determined to get the Ministry of Defence back into shape

after more than a decade of chaos and a Labour. We always knew it

would be hard, especially with a �38 billion black hole in the MoD

budget. But the national deficit left behind by Labour also has a

direct impact on our national security and our standing in the

world. You can be strong if you're broke. That is what Labour always

fails to understand. George Osborne has Binstead fast in his

determination to deal with the deficit -- has been that Stead fast

-- and he has my support. The nation lives within its means and

every department has to do its bit, but even after the MoD contribution

to deficit deduction -- reduction, we still have the 4th largest

defence budget in the world. And we continue to be one of only five

countries out of 28 in NATO meeting our 2% GDP obligation. Libya has

shown that Britain remains a global player. Our armed forces carried

out the evacuation of more than 1,400 UK and other nationals. The

RAF contributed 20 % of all coalition airstrikes. The Nato-led

mission will continue. That is until we are satisfied that the

people of Libya are no longer threatened by remnants of the

former regime. And although the campaign is not yet over, the

Libyan people can now shape their own destiny in a way that was

unthinkable to them even six months ago. There are those in Europe who

are calling for the EU to take a greater role in Europe's security.

Let me tell you, Europe already has a guarantor of its defence. It is

called NATO. It is nonsense to duplicate and diverge from NATO at

a time when resources are scarce, and the last thing we need is more

What really riles so many Tories is that while defences being cut, the

foreign aid budget is being increased will stop I asked the

International Development Secretary Andrew Mitchell what it was like to

preside over the most unpopular policy at the conference. I think

it is getting better understood, and increasingly popular. Some of

the polling suggests it is the case. I had the chance to make a speech

at the conference on Sunday where I set out the reasons for this, that

even in these extremely difficult economic times we have a plan which

stands by our commitments on developments and we do this because

it is the right thing to do, and the national interest. Do you

accept there could be circumstances where you can keep to the

commitment? It is a commitment predicated on the size of the

national cake, not a fixed figure. That is the right commitment to

make and we have set out quite clearly, as George Osborne did

earlier this year, what our spending plans are and we have

every intention of sticking to the plans. But if the economy goes into

recession, which is now a possibility, because you don't have

to blame the government for that, and if the Eurozone goes into

meltdown and unemployment starts to soar and living standards collapse

even more, we will still continue with our commitment to spend

billions on oversee the -- overseas aid? We are clear on this, and it

is the right thing and you see the British support across this to the

disaster in the Horn of Africa where although times are more

straitened than the past, people asked -- are more general. It is

part of the British character, but it is part of national security.

The budget goes to ensure we are more secure. The security is not

only gain by guns and bullets but also by training the police in

Afghanistan, building up government structures in Middle East, getting

girls into school in the Horn of Africa. The youth except that if

the conference was a Democratic gathering -- do you accept that if

the conference was a Democratic gathering them about 70 % of the

people they would rather stop the collapse in police numbers and the

cuts in defence than finance your department's budget? Do you accept

that is the reality? They may be wrong or right, but that is the

reality? The I think the number of people in the Conservative Party

there have reservations about the development budget is falling all

the time, and the reason is we are getting across the point that it is

the right thing to do and in our national interest and we have made

our plans which clearly were set out by the government and have

secured international recognition and respect, which is why we have

German rates of interest although we have Greek levels of debt, and

those plans include giving strong support to the police and making

sure the front line is preserved and making sure we have strong

defence forces of the country, which was the result of the vote

last year, and standing by commitments and not Balancing books

on the back of the poorest people here in Britain or overseas. Sombre

and muted sum up the Dome -- mood in Manchester this week except from

a brief flap about a cat. We asked Quentin Letts of the Daily Mail for

his take. Leadership for a better future, that is the slogan in

Manchester. But it was a leader from the past to start to the

conference of. William Hague. Last year he had a streaky time with the

activists. There had been a row about him sharing a bedroom with a

special adviser, but this year the relationship between William Hague

and the activists is back on. Good speech. Now we are embarked on the

most difficult, challenging and urgent task of our lives. To take a

country that Gordon Brown and all of the people called Edu who ran

the Labour Party to make it strong and confident again, and that is

what we are determined to do. That is a magnificent sight. Real

tweak. Fantastic examples of the old-fashioned Tory. On the whole,

the activists here, if they are activists, have been suited chances,

the smell of Commerce, what happened to the Tory party of the

shires? The Tory conference is the only time we ever see Steve Hilton,

the Svengali like figure in Downing Street. Sometimes we spot the man.

And there he was, rare footage, showing him with an influential

backbencher. Was he leaning on him? Last week you said the government

policy was incoherent and inconsistent. What has changed?

you can see consistency in a speech and it is a huge step forward. It

will be widely welcomed by people in the country. You have not been

nobbled by Downing Street? You know me well enough. Talking to back

pensions is not the only arm bending it goes on. Look at this --

backbenchers. Look at this. That is the sort of thing the Treasury does

to statistics. Let's be honest, all politicians dream of standing here

at the door of Number Ten. One who dreams it more than those days

Boris Johnson. The Mayor of London gave his routine speech, so routine

that some of it were reheated from last year, but the delegates liked

him and he goes down very well. But is he really credible for this

place? I'm not convinced. We are also insisting on homes big enough

for families with children and rooms that are big enough for human

beings rather than whole bits. -- Hobbit. None of us are getting any

smaller, as you might have noticed. Boris lacks the seriousness of

George Osborne. The Chancellor gave a speech about deficit reduction

and did have the patina of gravity. Yet his speech did not somehow lift

off. The activists gave him respectable applause, but the

clapping was no stronger than you would find at a county cricket

match. We are in a debt crisis. It is not a normal recovery. You

So we reach the end of conference season and I cannot say on Surrey.

There has been a decadence here. It was the same as the Labour

conference and the Liberal Democrats. We have not been able to

take the cameras into the bars late at night but the drinking has been

sybaritic and the lobbying, I tell you, if the voters and viewers of

Britain knew what went on at these events they would be horrified.

That is it from Manchester, indeed for the party conference courante -

- coverage on 2011. The day the Prime Minister tried to convince us

there would be good times ahead but only after we got through the

horrendous economic outlook. The Tories left Manchester today

knowing that their political fate depends on how well Mr Cameron and

his team whether the gathering economic storms. I'll be back with

The Daily Politics on BBC Two tomorrow at noon and I'll be back