Okay, not original, and can’t remember to whom the credit goes.
Heard Cameron’s first major interview as leader on Today this morning. Initial thoughts–
a) He’ll have changed his voice within six months. It needs to deepen–sounds too insecure.
b) Also within six months he’ll have dropped into some version of estuary for at least one interview. It’s not that he sounds cut-glass posh, rather banker-posh.
c) He needs serious work on his brief, and on developing the stock non-answers. He was very good and clear on the relationship to the European Party, less so on other issues. He sounded like he was too eager to follow the interviewer’s lead. It’s refreshing to hear someone trying to answer the questions, but after a few months of that it will sound like he doesn’t know what he’s doing.
d) Appointing people like Goldsmith is brave. Almost courageous. Will the mass of the party allow him to turn it where he wants to go? His launch was sublime from a marketing POV. But will that give him extra powers in the battle for the soul of the party?
e) John Gummer? William Hague? Come on. I’ve never understood the reverence for the latter. Even as a Yorkshireman.
WHich way is he going to go? Libertarian, small state-ish? Surely not with the flat tax nonsense? Will we see a solution that suits Britain, or a version of Blairism–US solutions made to fit. At least he’s not posed with his kids outside church and proclaimed moral values so far.