New PM?

After David Cameron's speech at the Conservative Party Conference in Manchester, foreign commentators started portraying him as a certain successor to Gordon Brown as Prime Minister, but on the home front reviews have been rather mixed. We may not be just witnessing the birth of the new PM, but the sentiment has been clearly turning away from the Conservative Party and it's the Tories who seem to be going with the flow of the public opinion now. Seen as good at handling the economy, Cameron's party has unrolled a programme of austerity measures, including spending cuts, pay freezes and a timetable for later retirement, in an effort to pay down Britain's budget deficit, the single most important issue identified by the frontrunners for the new government. Disenchated with politicians, the British public may be a little reluctant in handing out an easy, overwhelming victory to the Conservaties, who appear to lack temperament and momementum of the New Labour in 1997, but after 12 years of Labour rule, there is a growing expectation for a change.

It's interesting David Cameron, a matter-of-fact politician representing quite a rigid, business-like party, ventured a personal, emotional address at the conference, orientated towards inspiration rather than policy details. Importantly, he chose to include references to his son's death, a personal tragedy that took away the 4-year-old Ivan this year and moved Britain.

Language to take:

81 by way of, as in "His talk included little by way of policy details",
82 make a pitch for, a useful idiom meaning try (persuade somebody), as in "Like many other speakers, she made a pitch for stopping Muslim immigration",
83 a widening wealth gap,
84 to default on one's debt = nie wywiązywać się ze spłaty długów