A New Leader for Britain's Conservatives

The Times: The great gamble---

THE Conservatives yesterday staked their future on David Cameron, the most inexperienced person to become leader of a British political party since William Pitt the Younger.

Mr Cameron, at 39, faces Tony Blair across the dispatch box at Question Time today after becoming the 26th leader of the Conservative Party. He scored a decisive victory over David Davis, beating the Shadow Home Secretary by more than two to one, gathering 134,446 votes to 64,398.

And, in a swift illustration of his determination to reclaim the centre ground for the Conservatives, he broke with the legacy of Thatcherism, declaring that there was such a thing as society, and promised a new style of politics that would mean the Tories backing the Government if they thought it was right for the country.

He told his party to stop grumbling and to accept modern Britain as it was.

With the authority of his massive victory behind him, Mr Cameron prepared to lay down the law to MPs, saying that he wanted an end to “Punch and Judy politics — the name-calling, backbiting, point scoring and finger pointing.”

His first test of that approach will come today when he becomes the fifth Tory leader to face Mr Blair. Last night he was in deep consultation with aides, debating whether to use today’s appearance to reflect a more consensual attitude or to attack Mr Blair over the Pre-Budget Report and Europe.

This afternoon he will travel to East London to deliver a speech in which he is expected to promise that, under the Tories, the voluntary sector would take over the current role of the public sector in tackling family breakdown, poor school standards, crime and rundown public spaces.

His “social action” plans have been chosen for his first policy announcement to show that the Tories are about to enter previous “no-go” territories. His next statement, on Friday, will be about the environment, a similarly unfashionable subject for the Conservatives in the past.