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Below is the text of the speech made by the then Leader of the Opposition, David Cameron, to the Institute of Directors in Northern Ireland on 26th October 2006.

It’s a great pleasure for me to return to Belfast as the guest speaker at your annual lunch.

As I said in Scotland recently, every part of the United Kingdom is precious to me and the party I lead.

That applies equally, of course, to Northern Ireland.

I’ll deal with the prospects for political progress briefly.

But today I want to talk mainly about the importance of economic progress.

Part of that involves economic liberalisation and achieving competitiveness in the global marketplace.

And I’ll explain how I believe we can do that.

By promoting deregulation.

By introducing tax reform.

And, particularly in the context of Northern Ireland, by increasing the size of the private sector as a percentage of the economy as a whole.

But I’m going to argue that if economic progress is to bring social stability, economic liberalism – low taxes, deregulation, stable monetary policy – is not enough on its own. We need to add to it, with ideas for economic empowerment.

We must recognise that the rising tide of the open economy does not always lift all boats and that, for some people, the bottom rungs of the ladder to prosperity are broken and need to be fixed.

That means investment in training, skills, education and recognising the human and personal development that people need to help them out of poverty.

This, in turn, needs a new approach to politics. Government alone cannot empower people or give them the tools for success.

We need social responsibility. A new role for the voluntary sector, for social enterprise and, yes, for business.

Political progress

But first, the political situation.

Following St Andrews and as we approach the first deadline in the Governments’ timetable, it’s worth telling you my position.

My party supports devolution.

We believe that government is better when it is closer to people and when decisions are taken locally.

I’m in no doubt that a fully functioning Assembly will provide much greater degree of accountability for local decisions than can ever be the case under direct rule.

Decisions about domestic rates or academic selection should be made here, not in Whitehall or a Westminster Committee Room.

St Andrews was clearly a significant step forward towards the restoration of devolution.

I wish Tony Blair well and hope that this initiative succeeds.

But power-sharing will only work if every political party and every Minister in the Executive sticks to the same, basic democratic rules and gives full support to the police, the courts and the rule of law.

So the reality is that Sinn Fein must deliver on policing.

No more is being asked of them than that they play by the same democratic rules that are accepted by every other political party in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland.

Backing the police means more than just joining the Policing Board.

It means reporting crime and co-operating with the police at all levels.

It means encouraging people from your community to join the police.

And it means passing on evidence of crime to the police – such as in the case of Robert McCartney.

Sinn Fein must be clear about these things. But I hope Unionists will be equally clear – about their response.

If Sinn Fein makes these moves – as St Andrews requires them to do – then, difficult as it undoubtedly will be for some, I believe that unionists would be absolutely right in re-establishing a power-sharing, devolved government.

That means locally elected and accountable ministers from both main traditions working together for the good of Northern Ireland.

It is a big step for Dr Paisley to sit down with Mr Adams. But in time it has to happen if devolution and power-sharing are to take place and work.

And success also means a commitment to co-operation on matters of shared interest with the Republic of Ireland and throughout these islands as a whole.

And it means presenting to the world a new, outward looking and optimistic face of Northern Ireland.

Such a political settlement would set the seal on the transformation that’s taken place in Northern Ireland over the past fifteen years.

My Party wants to make it happen – and while we are the Opposition, we are the loyal Opposition – and we will never play politics with the future of Northern Ireland.

Economic progress

Let me turn to the economy.

Enormous progress has already been made – a great deal of it down to you in the business community.

Everyone knows that, for Northern Ireland, economic success has been one of the dividends of political change.

What is less clearly understood is that economic success has, in turn, driven forward that political change.

Unemployment is lower than in most other regions of the country.

One only has to look at the city centre here in Belfast to see the amount of new investment that’s coming in – here, and also in towns and cities across Northern Ireland.

House prices are rising faster than virtually anywhere else in the United Kingdom.

And of course without the threat from terrorism people are able to go about their daily business in a way that was unthinkable just over a decade ago.

I accept that there are big problems that need tackling.

The transport infrastructure needs modernising. Investment is required to upgrade water and sewage services.

But on the whole there is reason for optimism about the progress that Northern Ireland has made.

ECONOMIC LIBERALISATION

Competitiveness in the global marketplace

In order to sustain progress, we need to recognise the harsh realities of the competitive global economy. Business can locate anywhere. So government needs to get real about competitiveness.

We need a Government that asks some straight forward questions.

Are we making it easier, or harder, to set up a business?

Are we making it easier, or harder, to employ people? Is the overall burden of tax, public spending and borrowing going up or down?

Politicians need to understand the realities of life for the entrepreneur and wealth creator.

Does it take an employer more time, or less time, to fill in their tax return?

Is an employer spending more time, or less time, dealing with red tape?

Are the costs of complying with legislation and regulation going up, or down?

These are the real tests of an open economy. Those are the questions my government would ask. At the moment Labour cannot give positive answers to those questions.

Unfortunately, under the current Government the United Kingdom has slipped from fourth to tenth in the world economic competitiveness league.

With regulation up, tax up, interference up, the foot of government is pressing down on the windpipe of British business. We’ve got to take that foot off.

Deregulation

One way to do that is to make the economy competitive is to reduce the burdens that business faces.

The CBI estimates that £50 billion of new regulations have been introduced since 1997.

We need to tackle regulation at source. We need to look at the vast expansion of litigation under no win / no fee. We need to stop the gold plating of directives. And we need to go further, not having dozens of goals from an EU negotiation – but just one: to get out of the Social Chapter.

Tax reform

Let me say something about tax.

Under the current Chancellor, business has been, quite simply, over-taxed. We used to have some of the lowest rates of business tax; now we have some of the highest.

In the modern world, firms are competing not just within Northern Ireland…

Or in an island of Ireland or UK context…

But in a global market where the challenge from countries like China and India grows more formidable by the day.

And in the modern world, it’s the lower-tax economies that will be the most competitive.

You know better than me that we only have to look south, to the Republic of Ireland, to see the truth of that.

Northern Ireland shares a land border with a country that currently enjoys a much lower rate of corporation tax than we do in the United Kingdom.

People here are aware of this – and are calling for taxation measures to help.

There’s widespread support for the idea that Northern Ireland should have a separate rate of corporation tax to the rest of the UK.

And there’s the Northern Ireland Manufacturing Group’s campaign on industrial de-rating.

Across the country, there are lots of calls for tax cuts.

I hear them. I understand them.

Last week, the Conservative Party’s Tax Commission published its report.

The members of that Commission, led by Michael Forsyth, are men and women with a wealth of experience of industry, trade, finance and social policy.

They are also independent minded.

They have done what I asked and presented my Party with a menu of options for tax reform that deserve serious consideration.

Tax breaks specific to Northern Ireland would have to be thought through in the context of overall Exchequer support for this part of the UK and the precedent that might be set for other parts of the United Kingdom.

I will look seriously and with an open mind at any well-argued, carefully modelled case that business here puts forward.

But we are clear about the framework of our tax policy.

Sound money means that we shall always put stability ahead of tax cuts.

So we will not be promising up-front, unfunded tax reductions at the next election.

But we will share the proceeds of growth, so over time we will be able to reduce taxes.

We will also rebalance our tax system.

Green taxes on pollution will rise to pay for reductions in family taxes.

The Tax Reform Commission’s report sets out some options for doing that.

But tax reform isn’t just about reducing or rebalancing taxes.

It’s also about making tax much more simple and transparent.

Tax law in the UK has developed in a piecemeal fashion over a long period of time without any systematic or overall review.

Tolley’s Tax Handbook of the British Tax Code was 4,555 pages in 1997.

Nine years later it has doubled to over 9,800 pages.

That’s 10 times longer than Tolstoy’s War and Peace. And I’ll tell you something else…it’s much less of a good read.

A survey of British businesses carried out for the Tax Reform Commission found that more than three quarters of businesses thought the tax system had become more complex in the last five years.

And the number saying the tax system had become less complex?

Two per cent. They must be either incredibly clever or incredibly stupid.

Rising complexity is at the root of the increasingly antagonistic relationship between government and business over tax avoidance.

A simpler tax system would stop the endless game of cat and mouse.

Complex taxes are harming our competitiveness and driving away investment.

We believe that when it comes to business tax, by removing exemptions and broadening the base on which tax is charged, we could simplify the system and reduce headline rates.

That will be our goal.

Growing the private sector

Within Northern Ireland, the private sector is performing well.

Northern Irish companies are doing fantastic business the world over – Mivan, Lagan, Norbrook and FG Wilson to name a few.

But I agree with those who say that the Northern Ireland economy needs re-balancing.

Currently around two-thirds of it is dependent, directly or indirectly, on the public sector.

That compares with about one third in the south-east of England.

It makes the local economy particularly susceptible to a slowdown in the current growth in public expenditure.

Only last month the First Trust Bank’s quarterly survey of the Northern Ireland economy concluded that ‘overall economic growth is likely to slacken in 2007’ and warned:

‘Businesses that are dependent upon the state sector should recognise that public expenditure growth in the years ahead will be slower than in the past’.

That is not healthy.

So there is a widespread consensus – that includes the Government – on the need to reduce the role of the state and the public sector, and to boost the private sector in delivering growth and prosperity.

My aim is clear – to make the United Kingdom the best place to set up and do business.

And, within the UK, to ensure that Northern Ireland is a full participant in this dynamic enterprise culture.

ECONOMIC EMPOWERMENT

Of course, economic prosperity benefits everyone but we should be honest in acknowledging that some people are not in a position to take advantage of it.

That is why any policy of economic liberalisation must be accompanied by economic empowerment for those left behind.

There is growing prosperity here, but also some of the most disadvantaged parts of the United Kingdom, suffering all the problems associated with social exclusion.

I saw some of these at first hand when I visited the Shankill area last December.

A place where very few people have even a single GCSE… where the opportunities for getting on and getting up are incredibly limited.

While grammar schools in Northern Ireland produce the best exam results in the United Kingdom, there are still far too many children leaving school with few, or no, qualifications.

Of course I oppose the Government’s attempts to change the status of schools without the approval of people locally. But we must also do more to encourage those in the most disadvantaged areas to see education as an opportunity, not an irrelevance.

Reading is crucial, too.

If you can’t read, it’s hard to play anything more than a walk on part in the economy.

In Northern Ireland, just under a quarter of 11 year olds failed to achieve level 4 or better at Key Stage 2 English.

Put simply, that means they don’t have command of the basics.

Getting children to read competently when they leave primary school is the greatest single contribution we could make to transforming their opportunities in later life.

Today, there are almost 20,000 young people in Northern Ireland who are not in work or in full time education.

We can’t afford to write them off or leave it to the paramilitaries to give them some sense of purpose in their lives.

So economic empowerment means fixing the broken rungs at the bottom of the ladder from poverty to wealth.

There are 113,000 people in Northern Ireland on incapacity benefits, many of whom have the ability and the will to work – at least part-time – if the system only supported and encouraged them to do so.

Human capital is the most important resource of the open economy.

I see it as a key task of modern government to find ways of helping excluded groups back into the mainstream of our society.

And more often than not it will not be the Government that has the answers – it will be social enterprises, voluntary groups, community organisations and, yes, business that has the answers.

So yes we need to roll back the state in terms of rebalancing the economy, between the state sector and the private sector.

But we also need to roll forward society in terms of all recognising our responsibility to help the disadvantaged and build a strong society.

That is what I mean by social responsibility – recognising that government alone cannot tackle these problems.

We should be looking at a new deal with the voluntary sector – longer term contracts and funding to deal with the toughest challenges.

We should look at new ways to help those stuck in deprivation – perhaps easing the rules that say you lose benefit if you do more than 16 hours voluntary work. For many that is the path back to work – so why block it?

And just as Enterprise Zones helped in the 1980s with a broken economy, why not create Social Action Zones, cutting burdens from business and charities that help crack deprivation in some of our poorest neighbourhoods.

When I was growing up, when I first began working in politics, Northern Ireland only ever seemed to be associated with bad news.

Today, Northern Ireland is changing – and for the better.

There’s still some distance to travel and some issues to be resolved.

But hopefully we’re getting there.

I want to see Northern Ireland as a peaceful, stable and prosperous part of the country.

I want to see a shared future for people of all traditions, based on reconciliation, democracy and the rule of law.

And I look forward to working with you over the coming years to help make that a reality.

I want politics in Northern Ireland to be about the real things – schools, hospitals, tax, not about timetables, deadlines and institutional arrangements.

And I want the Conservative Party to be a part of that new politics.

We’re moving in a new direction.

Leading the debate. Pulling ahead of a tired Government. Developing policies for the future.

In doing so, one thing is certain.

My Party’s commitment to Northern Ireland, and to all its people, will be whole hearted and unshakeable.

Below is the text of the speech made by the then Leader of the Opposition, David Cameron, to the King’s Fund on 9th November 2006.

I’m hugely grateful to the King’s Fund for hosting this event today.

It was here, in January, that I first explained the change in this Party’s attitude to the NHS.

We are committed to improving the NHS for everyone, rather than helping a few to opt out.

And we are committed to the NHS ideal, ruling out any move towards an insurance-based system.

I’d also like to thank Niall Dickson for hosting this event today.

Niall, and the King’s Fund, are fantastic champions of the NHS.

You make a vital contribution to the debate – in all political parties and none – on how the NHS can be improved, and we are delighted to have the benefit of your expert advice.

Today, I’d like to set out our vision for the NHS and for healthcare in this country.

To spell out our commitment to the NHS, and to explain the five key components of our approach.

Stephen Dorrell, who is leading the work of our Policy Group, will then set out the background to the interim report which his Group is publishing today.

Stephen and his team have consulted widely with healthcare professionals and are contributing to the serious long-term thinking that we need if we are to deliver lasting improvements in the NHS in government.

Our Policy Groups are dealing with many complex issues, and they are not in the business of offering up easy answers or rushed conclusions.

After that, Andrew Lansley – our indefatigable Shadow Secretary of State for Health – will discuss the current state of the NHS, why we need more independence for the NHS, and how we might go about achieving it through an NHS Independence Bill.

Our Commitment to the NHS

So first, let me restate our commitment to the NHS.

I believe that the creation of the NHS is one of the greatest achievements of the 20th century.

It is founded on the noble but simple ideal that no person should ever have to worry about their healthcare.

On that, there is a consensus across the parties.

All parties support increased funding for the NHS.

We do not differ with the Government over funding for the NHS – only about using those funds to provide the health service we need and deserve.

The NHS must change for the better, and we must be prepared to argue for the changes that the NHS needs.

I believe that we need a new direction for the NHS, and that new direction should be based on our idea of social responsibility.

That means moving away from the idea that Government’s role is to micromanage the delivery of healthcare in Britain, and moving towards greater professional responsibility for those who work in the NHS.

Five Key Components of Our Approach

There are five key components of our approach to the NHS.

First, to guarantee that the NHS has the money it needs.

With a Conservative Government, real terms spending on public services will rise.

And as our economy grows, one of the most important calls on the proceeds of growth will be the NHS.

That is what we mean by sharing the proceeds of growth.

The second key component of our approach will be to end the damage caused by pointless and disruptive reorganisations of the NHS.

We will not mess around with existing local and regional structures: we will allow the current structures to settle down and bed in.

The third element of our approach will be to work with the grain of the Government’s reforms where they are doing the right thing.

So we will go further in increasing the power and independence of GPs and PCTs, putting them in the driving seat.

We support foundation hospitals. We want to see all hospitals have greater freedom.

Fourth, we will take the politics out of the management of the NHS, getting rid of centrally-imposed and politically motivated targets.

Under Labour, politicians have interfered in professional judgments and diminished professional responsibility by second-guessing the experts.

It has been described as the “death of discretion.”

So we will allow professionals to make the important judgements about the best interests of their patients

And the fifth key component of our approach will be to bring fair funding to the NHS.

We will end political meddling over money – removing the scope for fiddling by distributing resources for reasons of political expediency rather than clinical need.

That is why I am announcing today our intention to introduce an NHS Independence Bill.

It will offer a statutory framework that will take politicians out of the day to day running of the NHS.

Our plan is to publish a Bill in the New Year, and we hope that the Government will work with us on the details and help produce a Bill that commands support on all sides of the House of Commons.

If implemented by Spring 2008, it would give the NHS the best possible 60th birthday present.

So my message to the Government is clear: the NHS matters too much to be treated like a political football.

Let’s work together to improve the NHS for everyone.

Let’s give the NHS fair funding, and let’s give taxpayers better value for money by getting rid of the targets and bureaucracy and pen-pushing that’s all about politicians’ priorities, not the needs of patients.

Accountability

As we take the politics out of the NHS, we need to make sure that it becomes more accountable to patients: greater independence for NHS professionals will not mean a blank cheque.

It will strengthen accountability, because professionals in the NHS will be more clearly accountable for the things they’re responsible for, and for raising standards.

That’s how any professional organisation works, and with greater professional responsibility in the NHS will come greater professional accountability.

Our plans will mean a change in the role of central government.

It will remain accountable to the electorate for the total amount of money spent on the NHS, for setting the statutory framework for improving public health, and for decisions about the scope of what is offered by the NHS.

Public Health

But healthcare isn’t just about hospitals and GPs.

There is an enormous job to be done in public health.

In this area, we are committed to a strong role for the Department of Health.

We want it to be much more active outside the NHS in promoting public health, as Andrew will describe.

Conclusion

We are committed to improving the NHS for everyone.

We recognise the need for change in order to deliver those improvements.

But instead of imposing change insensitively from above, we want to work with doctors, nurses, ancillary staff and administrators so we achieve sustainable, bottom-up improvement.

That is the way to give taxpayers value for money, and the British people the world-class, publicly funded healthcare they want.

Below is the text of the speech made by the then Leader of the Opposition, David Cameron, to the Ethnic Media Conference on 29th November 2006.

Thank you for inviting me here today.

I believe that this is an important event because the representation of black and minority ethnic communities in the media isn’t just an issue for people here.

It’s relevant to everyone because it’s part of building a more cohesive country.

We need fresh perspectives on our dynamic and changing society and that can only happen if the media…

…which provides the means whereby we see and understand ourselves…

…reflects change as well as reporting it.

Conservative perspectives

Encouraging change is actually a part of what I call social responsibility.

Government on its own cannot solve the problems of and under-representation.

We all have a role to play.

Individuals.

Families.

Businesses.

Local government.

And the media.

Expecting the Government to legislate problems away isn’t just problematic – it’s also a cop out.

Every organisation should encourage ethnic minority participation, not because the state is breathing down its neck but because it’s the right thing to do.

In that context, I’m acutely aware of my own responsibilities as leader of the Conservative Party.

Like the media, politics is a vital part of our national life.

That’s why we need to address the current under-representation of minorities and lack of diversity that exists in all parties, including my own.

We should start by being honest.

In the past, political parties did not always make people from black and minority ethnic communities feel particularly welcome in their ranks.

Was there racism?

Of course, it was an element.

To a lesser extent, there still is – in all parties.

The difference is that now we regard it as entirely unacceptable.

Speaking personally, I’m intolerant of racism and am determined to root it out.

But the biggest obstacle in the part to ethnic minority participation in the Conservative Party was something else.

An assumption of virtue.

We had a straightforward approach to these matters.

In the past, the Conservative Party thought it was enough to remove formal barriers to entry and to provide equality of opportunity.

We believed that we were operating a meritocracy.

But we weren’t.

The fact is that it’s not enough just to open the door to ethnic minorities.

If people look in and a see an all-white room they are less likely to hang around.

An unlocked door is not the same as a genuine invitation to come in.

That’s why the Conservative Party needs positive action if we are to represent Britain as it is.

This isn’t just morally right – it’s enlightened self-interest.

If we don’t change we will be at a huge disadvantage.

A mono-ethnic party cannot represent a multi-ethnic country.

How can we understand the country we aspire to govern if the conversation inside the Conservative Party doesn’t reflect the conversation in the broader community?

How will we will improve the representation of mixed communities if we ourselves do not have a broad range of candidates.

Of course, MPs and councillors and others in elected office do their best to represent everyone but, inevitably, they will miss things.

Better representation of black and minority communities is vital for all of us.

We are all part of the same country, the same political system.

In order to feel that, we need to show it.

A system that locks out all the talent in ethnic minority communities is failing them – and failing everyone else as well.

Conservative progress

To be fair, we’ve already made quite a lot of progress.

My generation of Conservatives has grown up in a multi-ethnic society and are comfortable with diversity in a way that older people, perhaps, were not.

Inclusion is second nature to people my age.

There’s no sense of ‘them’ and ‘us’.

We care about ability not ethnicity.

That’s why, before the last election, Adam Afriyie was selected as the Conservative candidate for Windsor..

…and Shailesh Vara was selected as the Conservative candidate for North West Cambridgeshire.

Two black and minority ethnic Tories chosen for two virtually all-white constituencies.

Both Adam and Shailesh are now MPs and I know they will be joined on the Conservative benches by many more people from ethnic minority backgrounds.

For example, Priti Patel and Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones have recently beaten stiff competition to be selected as Parliamentary candidates in Conservative-held seats.

At a local level too, we’ve made strides.

One of the most encouraging aspects of May’s council results was the election of a whole new generation of ethnic minority Tory councillors.

In London boroughs like Hackney, Sutton, Ealing, Harrow, Croydon and Redbridge.

And across the Country in Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Walsall, Hyndburn, Worcester, Southend, Portsmouth, Northampton, Bradford, Wakefield, Coventry and Kirklees.

They are helping us get into communities where Conservatives have been absent for too long

Often, these are towns and areas where the BNP is active.

I want our new councillors and council candidates to lead the fightback against racism and division.

Conservative action

We’ve taken big steps forward.

But we’re not resting on our laurels.

Instead we’re raising our game with a set of specific initiatives.

That’s why today I can announce a new drive to broaden the base of the Conservative Party…

…encouraging people from black and minority ethnic communities to get involved at all levels…

…as members, activists, council candidates and parliamentary candidates.

There will be three key components:

1) Monitoring

First, monitoring.

I know that monitoring makes some uneasy.

They say, “Look, my identity is British, not black or Asian or anything else so why should I be treated differently?”

But if we fail to find how well we as a body are doing in terms of increasing representation of black and minority ethnic communities we have no way of remedying the situation.

We need the facts.

I’m launching a three pronged project to monitor the progress of people from ethnic minority background within the Conservative Party.

There’ll be new programme of ethnic monitoring of council candidates to assess the Party’s ongoing success in attracting BME candidates for local council elections.

All council groups will report to CCHQ on how many ethnic minority councillors and council candidates they have.

Next, we’ll also monitor the progress of all Parliamentary candidates, from initial application to ultimate success.

Last, Party headquarters itself will now record the numbers of people from ethnic minorities the Conservative Party employs to ensure fairness and transparency.

2) Roadshow

Second, Conservatives will hold a series of events in Britain’s major cities, run in partnership with Operation Black Vote, to encourage greater political participation amongst BME communities and, unashamedly, to recruit fresh talent to our ranks.

It will feature high profile members of the Shadow Cabinet and other leading Conservatives.

3) Internships

Third, we are initiating a new bursary to fund an intern programme enabling 20 young people a year from BME communities across Britain to work for the Conservative Party either at Party headquarters or in Parliament.

Moving beyond multiculturalism

Taken together, these measures are a necessary part of equipping the Conservative Party to govern modern Britain.

That’s especially important because I sense a change in the climate when it comes to race and ethnicity.

A positive change.

I think that Britain is ready for a grown up conversation on this subject.

Inevitably, it’s a conversation that will be led by a younger generation of Britons that simply doesn’t have the hang ups and preoccupations of the past.

For people growing up today, skin colour and racial origin are, in themselves, increasingly irrelevant to the way that people see themselves and each other.

As a country, we’re comfortable with multiple identities.

What is a problem, however, is the weakening of our common culture.

That’s why the key issues of tomorrow will be cohesion, inclusion and identity.

Racism, as traditionally understood, may be in decline but it’s now appearing in new and unexpected forms.

For example, as Britain becomes more diverse there is a growing potential for inter-ethnic tensions, such as we witnessed in Handsworth.

Until quite recently, it was seen as somehow impolite to point out that non-white people are capable of holding racist views too.

Any serious conversation about tackling racism must move beyond old Marxist cliches about power relationships and focus on the fear and ignorance that is the real cause of racism.

And, talking of old Marxist cliches, let me say a word about Ken Livingstone.

I see that the Mayor of London has launched another attack on Trevor Phillips for daring to point out the possible downsides of the ideology of multiculturalism.

Insulting Trevor by saying he should join the BNP isn’t a serious contribution to debate.

It’s a discreditable attempt by an ageing far left politician to hang on to a narrative about race that is completely out of date…

…rather than seeing people from ethnic minorities as full and equal citizens who would rather build a better life for themselves and their families than man the barricades at the behest of middle class white fantasists.

Ken’s problem is that the critique of multiculturalism is coming from a growing number of intelligent and thoughtful young people – who are themselves from ethnic minority backgrounds.

When I say ‘multiculturalism’ let’s be absolutely clear what I’m talking about.

I’m not referring to the reality of our ethnically diverse society that we all celebrate and only embittered reactionaries like the BNP object to.

I mean the doctrine that seeks to Balkanise people and communities according to race and background.

A way of seeing the world that encourages us to concentrate on what divides us, what makes us different.

Following the riots in a number of northern towns in 2001, the Cantle Report pointed out that some parts of Britain have become divided along ethnic grounds.

Today we have communities where people from different racial backgrounds rarely meet, talk or go into each others’ homes.

What’s worse is that official agencies and branches of government have sometimes colluded in, and even facilitated, this de facto apartheid.

It’s been done in the name of multiculturalism.

Grants have been doled out not on the basis of need but on the basis of race and religion.

Schools and community centres – paid for by the taxpayer – have been allowed to become mono-ethnic strongholds.

This has led to a strange paradox.

People from ethnic minorities are today less likely than ever before to encounter old-fashioned racism but, instead, they’ve become emeshed in multicultural policies that racialise them anew.

The principle of equality – that all people should be treated the same regardless of background, colour or creed – has become replaced with the principle of diversity, where all cultural identities must be given separate public recognition.

However well intentioned, the effect is that people end up being treated differently which merely fuels discontent.

It also promotes tribalism between different religious and ethnic groups.

Ethnic and faith communities compete for public resources and recognition instead of uniting on the basis of shared interests.

Multicultural policies provide a powerful incentive to proclaim one’s victim status.

This leads to a grievance culture – a zero sum game that views every concession to one group as a slight to others.

We saw this recently with the rows over the veil in schools and the cross at British Airways.

It is a climate that promotes racism rather than defeats it.

Building a united society

I believe that it’s time to discard the failed policies of the past.

We need to bring people together – and bring our society together.

All of us – rich and poor, black and white, Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Jew and Christian – have got far more that unites us than divides us.

I’m not pretending we can simply wave a magic wand.

Issues of social cohesion are incredibly complicated.

They need sensitive handling.

But with good will and common sense we can build a fair society.

For my part, I intend to focus on the concrete things that can bring people together.

Citizenship ceremonies.

Teaching English to new arrivals.

School exchanges.

A national school leaver programme that brings young people together from all parts of the country.

These are the things that can, over time, can make a difference.

But before I get the chance to do these things in government, I will do what I can in terms of our party.

Conclusion

Much has been done.

Much more will achieved in the future.

There is no room for complacency.

But I know one thing.

When it comes to the full and equal participation of people from ethnic minorities in British society, the Conservative Party is no longer part of the problem.

Quite the opposite.

We are determined to be part of the solution – and we’d like your help.

Below is the text of the speech made by the then Leader of the Opposition, David Cameron, in Hereford on 16th December 2005.

This is an exciting time in British politics.

Things are changing.

MODERN COMPASSIONATE CONSERVATISM

Two weeks ago, the Conservative Party voted for change.

It voted for a modern, compassionate Conservatism.

It voted to become a new, inclusive organisation, reflecting today’s Britain.

So I’ve taken decisive steps to change the face of the Conservative Party.

To end the scandal of women’s under-representation, and to increase the number of MPs from black and minority ethnic backgrounds and with disabilities.

We will reflect the country we aspire to govern, and the sound of modern Britain is a complex harmony, not a male voice choir.

Two weeks ago, the Conservative Party voted for positive politics.

So I’ve shown how we will be a consistent and constructive opposition.

We will back the Government when they do the right thing, and take a long-term approach to the challenges faced by Britain and the world.

We will focus on the future, and engage people – young, old, those who are committed to politics and those who have given up on it- in the task of meeting the challenges faced by our country and our world.

I believe that there are six big challenges we face, and that we must address them in an open-minded, creative and thoughtful way.

These challenges are complex and interconnected. They can’t be dealt with under neat headings or in simple boxes.

They require serious long-term thinking. They will never be tackled by “coming up with” policies to make newspaper headlines.

We need to develop policies on the basis of hard work and hard thinking, drawing on the best and most creative ideas, wherever they come from.

And so to investigate each of these six big challenges, and to develop the ideas that will form the basis of the next Conservative Manifesto…

…I will be appointing Policy Groups, not stuffed with politicians but led by the best thinkers, with a passion for change and a desire to get to grips with these difficult challenges.

I’ve already announced two of them.

To address the Social Justice Challenge, Iain Duncan Smith and Debbie Scott, one of Britain’s leading social entrepreneurs…

…will lead a Policy Group looking at how we empower individuals, communities and voluntary organisations and social enterprises…

…to tackle entrenched problems like persistent poverty, family breakdown, lack of aspiration and drug addiction.

To address the Quality of Life Challenge, John Gummer and Zac Goldsmith will lead a Policy Group looking at how to achieve strong but sustainable economic growth…

…they will think radically about issues like transport, energy, housing and the urban environment.

Over the next few weeks, I will be appointing similarly talented people to lead our work on meeting the challenges of…

…Globalisation and Global Poverty…

…National and International Security…

….Economic Competitiveness…

…and Public Service Improvement.

This is our agenda for the next four years.

I want everyone who believes in positive politics and who has a passion for change to get involved in the work of these Policy Groups.

I want our Policy Groups to be the national focus for debate, discussion and free thinking about these vital issues for the future of our country and our world.

It’s essential for their success that their reach goes beyond the world of Westminster policy wonks.

How can we begin to address the issues of social justice without hearing the voices of the black and minority ethnic communities…

…who live, disproportionately, within the inner cities where these problems are greatest?

How could a review of public services have any credibility without the input of the women who, in many cases, are at the front end of dealing with their children’s education, or their health?

The processes of transforming the face and the agenda of our party go hand in hand.

We will be drawing on the brightest and the best, men and women, within and without the Party, to help us understand the fundamental challenges facing Britain and to develop creative and radical solutions.

We’re going to take our time to get things right, and to enable everyone’s voice to be heard.

We’re going to be totally open and transparent. Everything the Policy Groups do will be published online.

If good ideas are generated along the way…

…that the Government, business, or anyone else wants to put into practice, that’s fantastic.

We will have made positive change happen, which is our only aim.

You can get involved today in the Policy Groups that have already been launched…

…go to socialjusticechallenge.com or qualityoflifechallenge.com.

The Policy Groups will report in eighteen months. I want those eighteen months to be the most exciting and creative eighteen months of political discussion this country has ever seen.

VALUES

Everything we do will be guided by the two core values at the heart of my kind of Conservatism: trusting people, and sharing responsibility.

I believe that the more you trust people, the more power and responsibility you give them, the stronger they and society become.

And I believe passionately that we’re all in this together – individuals, families, government, business, voluntary organisations.

We have a shared responsibility for our shared future.

Trusting people, and sharing responsibility.

These are the values we need to meet the challenges of the modern world

LABOUR HAVE FAILED 

I believe these values reach far beyond the Conservative Party. Many Liberal Democrats share these values.

And many Liberal Democrats share with us a clear analysis of why Labour have failed to live up to their promise.

It’s because this Labour Government doesn’t live by the values we need to succeed in the twenty-first century.

Instead of trusting people, Labour tell people what to do.

Instead of sharing responsibility, Labour take responsibility away from people.

You can see it in so many areas.

They’ve over-regulated the economy, making it harder for employers to create jobs, wealth and opportunity.

Their investment in public services has not been matched by nearly enough reform.

So the professionals who deliver healthcare and education are held back by a top-down, centralised system run from Whitehall.

Labour’s style of government shows how little they trust people, and how reluctant they are to share responsibility.

The spinning, the centralising, the partisan point-scoring, the desire to control and bully. All this is anathema to liberals everywhere.

As is Labour’s cavalier attitude to our most basic British values and democratic rights, like freedom of speech and due process of law.

Labour are casual about civil liberties at a time when it’s vital they’re upheld, to show strength and resolution against those who threaten our way of life.

And Labour have failed to deliver on one of the most important issues facing our country and the world: the environment and our quality of life.

How can Britain show real international leadership on issues like climate change if our own record is poor?

Our performance in recent years has fallen far short of the Government’s rhetorical commitments. Britain’s carbon emissions rose in five of the seven years from 1997 to 2004.

WE CAN CHANGE THINGS TOGETHER

There is a huge desire in this country to change all this.

I can feel the longing for a Government with the right priorities and the right attitude.

A modern, moderate, reasonable Government that takes a forward-looking, open-minded, long-term approach to the big challenges we face.

That attractive option is now a real political prospect.

If there was an election tomorrow, my Party would need to win a hundred and twenty six seats to win an overall majority.

Of those seats, twenty are held by the Liberal Democrats, with the Conservatives second in every one.

And in all but four of the rest – that’s a hundred and three seats – the Lib Dem vote is larger than the Labour majority.

There is a new home for Liberal Democrat voters – and so a real prospect of a change of Government – because today we have a Conservative Party that:

…believes passionately in green politics…

…that is committed to decentralisation and localism…

…that supports open markets and

…that is prepared to stand up for civil liberties and the rule of law…

…and which wants Britain to be a positive participant in the EU, as a champion of liberal values.

COME AND JOIN US

So I believe it’s time for Liberal Democrat voters, councillors and MPs that share these values and this agenda to come and join the new Conservative Party.

If you join us, we can together build a modern, progressive, liberal, mainstream opposition to Labour.

Improving public services by giving power to people, professionals and local communities.

Improving the environment and our quality of life by turning green words into action.

Strengthening our economy by freeing the creators of wealth, especially small businesses, to create the jobs and prosperity we need.

And improving the way our country is run by respecting civil liberties and our basic democratic rights.

NOW, MORE THAN EVER

We can build this modern mainstream movement now, more than ever, because the obstacles that once stood in its way are no longer there.

Issues that once divided Conservatives from Liberal Democrats are now issues where we both agree.

Our attitude to devolution and the localisation of power. Liberal Democrats have always been passionate about the importance of local decision-making…

…while Conservatives in the past seemed to stand for the centralisation of power.

In the 1980s, Mrs Thatcher had to take tough action to rein in local authorities like Liverpool and Lambeth whose political extremism was wrecking people’s lives.

Sometimes, this even tipped over into hostility – or the very least, a perceived hostility – towards local government in general.

But those days are behind us now.

So I say to Liberal Democrats everywhere: we, like you, are on the side of the local community, and want to give local people more power and control…

…over how their services are run…

…their neighbourhoods are policed…

…and their priorities are delivered.

Conservatives are now the largest party in local government.

We control the Local Government Association.

Conservative councils topped the Audit Commission’s league table this week.

Our support for localism, borne of experience and strengthened by our values – trusting people and sharing responsibility – is sincere and lasting.

The one piece of the devolution jigsaw that Conservatives don’t support and that Liberals still do is regional assemblies.

But the idea is now discredited and unpopular – not least among liberal voters.

Another dividing line has been the Iraq war.

My Party and the Liberal Democrats were on different sides of that argument.

But I say to Liberal Democrats everywhere: we’re on the same side now.

We want to see the same things happen as quickly as possible:

…democracy established…

…security guaranteed…

…and our troops coming home, as quickly as possible.

And finally, the issue where Conservatives and Liberal Democrats are united as ever before: the environment.

Chris Patten, John Gummer and Michael Howard were ground-breaking Conservative Environment Secretaries.

But, during our years in opposition, the environment has never been given star billing.

And too often, we’ve allowed the impression to develop that we Conservatives are supporters of economic growth at all costs…

The impression that we put the needs of big business before the future of the planet…

Or the impression that we always think in terms of four wheels good, anything else bad.

Well as someone who regularly uses both four wheels and two…

…and who believes in wealth creation but also that business has vital social and environmental responsibilities…

…I say to Liberal Democrats everywhere: join me in my mission to put green politics at the top of the national and international agenda.

CONCLUSION

It’s an incredible honour and privilege to lead the Conservative Party…

…and to have been given, through the result of the leadership contest, the authority to change the party so it reflects Britain today.

Reaching out to people of all ages and in all parties – those who are committed to politics and those who’ve given up on it.

And let me make one thing clear. I’m a liberal Conservative.

I’m determined to tackle the challenges faced by our country and our world in a moderate, forward-looking, progressive way.

And I hope, over the next weeks, months and years, that many Liberal Democrats will want to join us…

…to build a modern, compassionate Conservative Party…

…to help address the big challenges our society faces…

…and to be a growing voice for change, optimism and hope.

Below is the text of the speech made by David Cameron to the Conservative National Education Society on 16th June 2005.

Five years ago this Government decided to spend thousands of pounds of public money on an advertising campaign.

I loved it.

The ads had a simple message – and a true one.

They reminded us that “No-one forgets a good teacher”. Of all the influences on our lives, few are as profound as the inspiration of a good teacher.

Teaching is more than a profession, it is a vocation. It’s a calling to make the world a better place by working with the young to enrich their minds.

And there are few more important jobs than teaching.

Why?

Because there is no more important subject than education.

Importance of education

And it’s with the importance of education for the most disadvantaged in our society that I’d like to start.

A decent education is the best start in life that any child can have. It is the ladder up which all can climb. The chance for everyone – whatever their background – to better themselves.

If we want to create a genuine opportunity society, if we are determined to unlock human potential, if we believe – as I do, passionately – that every life is precious and no-one should have their chance to contribute written off, then we have to reform our education system.

For many children in state schools, especially those born with the fewest advantages in life, there has been a persistent failure to believe in their right to the best. They have been held back by what George Bush senior called the “soft bigotry of low expectations”.

We still have not built an education system which genuinely meets the needs of the disadvantaged.

In some ways, we’ve actually made it worse.

The goal of an opportunity society is receding from our grasp. 30 years ago, the percentage of children from state schools attending Oxford and Cambridge was two thirds. Today it is just one half.

The importance of education goes much further than ensuring social mobility.

Our failure to build a state education system which leaves no child behind has contributed to a society in which young lives are unnecessarily blighted.

Take the vital issue of teenage pregnancy. Young mothers, and their children, risk being consigned to a life of dependency and poverty.

Of course we can’t expect schools to have all the answers.

Parents, families, teachers, politicians – we’re all in this together. We have a shared responsibility to our children and to society.

But education has a crucial part to play. Would so many teenage girls get pregnant if they had been inspired at school, taught to be ambitious for themselves and equipped with the right skills to go out and get a job?

Would so many young men turn away from a life of responsibility, and towards anti-social behaviour if they were taught to read properly so that they could see the point of education rather than view it as something between a waste of time and a source of embarrassment?

After all, the connection between illiteracy and crime is evident: almost 70 per cent of our now record prison population cannot read or write properly.

There’s a link between a poverty of expectation, poverty in society and the reality of thousands of scarred lives.

We all know it.

Tackling the roots of these social problems depends on getting what happens in our schools right.

And if all our young people are to be given hope, rather than being allowed to drift to society’s margins, then we need to reform education to equip future generations for an ever more competitive world.

In the age of globalization the future is bleaker than ever for those without skills, but opportunities are richer than ever for those with them. In the twenty-first century there is no more important national resource than our human capital.

So: getting education right is vital if we are to have a socially mobile Britain, a socially cohesive Britain and an internationally competitive Britain which equips its citizens for the future.

But it also matters crucially for a fourth reason. It’s one that, strangely, politicians don’t talk about often enough.

Happiness.

I believe that education is one of the keys to happiness.

Education that stimulates, that inspires and that instills a love of books, of knowledge and of learning is one route to a happy and fulfilling life. You don’t have to take Mill’s side against Bentham in arguing that there are “higher forms of pleasure” to believe that loving learning is one way of loving life.

The economist Richard Layard has recently made a powerful case that public policy should not be oriented towards maximizing wealth, but rather towards increasing happiness. The relevance to education is clear.

Of course, we want to equip our children to compete effectively in the modern world. But education should be about so much more than that.

Good teaching should open our minds to the best that has been thought and written.

We should want our children to be inspired by history, learning of our country’s role in the expansion of freedom, enjoying the story of mankind’s progress through time.

We should demand that our children be allowed access to the arts, exploring the worlds of imagination that literature can open up, appreciating the beauty of what great talents have produced.

And we should recognize that in drama, music and sport – including competitive sport – the opportunity for self-expression, growth and achievement can be nurtured.

So, there is no more important issue for the country than education – and no greater challenge for us to get right.

Where there is political consensus, we should celebrate it. There is no point in parties bickering about matters on which we fundamentally agree.

The Government wants a diversity of schools. I agree. The Government is talking about devolving greater power to heads and governors. I have always shared this goal. Where these things actually happen, we will applaud and support them.

But where things are still going wrong, where the Government is failing to give the right lead, or where it fails to deliver on promises – and there are plenty of such areas – I will take a stand and try to build a new consensus.

In opposition – every bit as much as in government – politicians need to set out what they believe in, what their goals are, and what their compass will be. If you don’t – and if you don’t stick to them – you will get buffeted from one issue to another.

The principles I want to follow are clear.

That a good education is a birth right for all: a pledge that everyone mouths, but one that means nothing unless we are determined to confront under-achievement amongst the poorest in society.

That discipline is the first requirement for every school

That the basics of reading, writing and numeracy are the vital building blocks for every child.

That a good education should provide both the skills for life and a love of learning for its own sake.

That every child is different – and that not every school should be the same.

That a good education should mean challenging the sharpest minds and helping those who fall behind.

That all schools – state, church, voluntary, private – should celebrate their independence and autonomy.

That parents have rights to choice and to involvement – but that they also have clear responsibilities to the schools to which they send their children.

That these responsibilities include making sure their children turn up on time, are properly fed and appropriately turned out, and – above all – that they behave properly.

That the poor behaviour of a minority of children should never be allowed to wreck the proper education of the majority.

That teaching and learning vocational skills is every bit as worthwhile as teaching and learning knowledge.

That universities should be centres of excellence, independent from Government, with access based on merit.

The new Conservative agenda

In recent times party political debate has often been in danger of missing the big point in education.

The Labour Party has talked primarily about “resources”, talking about spending per pupil, per school and as a share of our national wealth.

The Conservative Party has talked more about “structures”, giving parents greater choices between different sorts of schools.

Both are important – but there is a danger of missing the absolutely vital bit in the middle: what actually happens in our state schools.

Will our children learn to read, write and add up properly? Will they be safe in class? Will they be stretched to the best of their abilities? Will they be taught the skills they need to have a successful career when they leave? Will our local school do the best for our child?

These are the questions parents ask themselves – the issues we stress about when considering our children’s education.

That’s why my focus is going to be simple and straightforward – on the basics.

Discipline. Standards. Promoting teaching methods that work. Scrapping those that don’t. Building on tests, league tables and exam standards that genuinely measure success, failure and progress. Exposing and demolishing those that dumb down, promote an “all must have prizes mentality” or simply waste time.

It is only once we have established what constitutes a good education that we should go on to ask: what stands in its way? How can we clear the obstacles in its path?

The big issues in education

There are five vital areas of weakness where we will question the Government, call them to account, seek and publish the clearest possible information – and take a stand on what needs to be done.

Literacy in primary schools.

Discipline in secondary schools.

Special Educational Needs.

The fact that bright children are being left out and non academic children are left behind.

And a system for testing and examining that – put simply – is currently not fit for purpose.

Literacy in primary schools

Firstly: in spite of progress made and the national literacy strategy, around one in five children leaves primary school unable to read properly, and one in three leaves without being able to write properly.

If you can’t read, you can’t learn. These children are lost to education. The waste – for them, for our country – is nothing short of a scandal.

The evidence that traditional teaching methods – particular synthetic phonics – are the best way of teaching children the basic building blocks of reading and writing is now absolutely clear.

We welcome the Government review of the National Literacy Strategy, but we are clear about the stand that should be taken and the battles that will have to be fought.

Phonics works. Tip toeing gently around this subject gets us nowhere. Another review – and another cohort of children will pass into secondary school unable to read and unprepared to learn.

The Government has got to say what works clearly, make the change and actually follow it through to the end.

Discipline in secondary schools

Second, discipline. If children don’t learnt to respect authority at school how can we expect them to respect others when they grow up?

We all know that lack of discipline is an issue that affects most schools, and cripples the learning process in many. The figures bear this out.

A teacher is assaulted every seven minutes of the school day. 17,000 pupils were expelled in a single term recently for violent behaviour. The scale of the problem was shown by an undercover documentary which showed a supply teacher’s battle with scenes of chaos in a variety of schools.

The Government has decided to hold another review. This is fine, as long as something comes of it. But everyone knows that often with this Government, calling for a review is seen as the end of the process.

We want to see the following clear and decisive action.

The unambiguous right for heads to expel unruly pupils – so it is clear where authority lies.

The abolition of appeals panels – so that heads cannot be undermined by having their decisions publicly reversed and disruptive children returned to the classroom.

The right to make home/school contracts binding, by letting heads refuse to accept children if parents don’t sign them.

On discipline, schools – all schools – should have autonomy. They are – and should be seen clearly as – places where children go to be taught and to learn, not reception centres for all children irrespective of how they behave.

As well as this change in approach to the autonomy of schools – and as well as the changes to the law I have set out – we need something else.

A change in culture. As I’ve said, with so many of these problems we’re all in it together. Government. Opposition. Parents. Teachers. Governors. Heads. Children.

Listen to children threatened with punishment who say “I know my rights” and listen to teachers to frightened to deal robustly with poor behaviour. And it is clear what is happening.

We are starting to treat teachers like children, and children like adults. That is wrong – and we should say so.

SEN

The system for dealing with special educational needs in this country is based on good intentions. The desire to see all children treated with equal love and care and attention is one we all share.

But the system is now badly in need of reform.

In some ways we are in danger of getting the worst of all worlds.

At one end, children who are finding it difficult to keep up are being dragged into the SEN bracket, when what they really need is rigorous teaching methods.

At the other end, children with profound needs are being starved of resources and inappropriately placed in mainstream schools.

The move towards inclusion was right for many children. No one – least of all me – wants to turn the clock back to saying that some children are “ineducable”.

But the pendulum has simply swung too far. The ideological obsession with holding all children in the same building for school hours, as if mere proximity connotes something profound or productive, has destroyed the education of many of society’s most vulnerable citizens.

It is foolish to pretend that some of the most challenged and challenging children in Britain can study alongside their mainstream peers with a few hours of extra assistance here and there, or the part time aid of a teaching assistant now and then.

They need constant attention from experts in facilities dedicated to their needs. It is expensive and it is painstaking but it is right.

Similarly, it is wrong to close schools for those with moderate disabilities, whose needs fall in the ground between that of the mainstream and those with severe conditions.

Forced into mainstream schools in which they are inevitably left behind, or alternatively into Severe Learning Disabilities schools in which they are never truly pushed to achieve, the plight of children with moderate learning disabilities is extremely troubling.

Children with learning difficulties or disabilities deserve better than to have their real needs waved away because of their totemic status as representatives of social inclusion. These are our children, not guinea pigs in some giant social experiment.

In the name of this inclusion agenda, centres of excellence are being torn down. When the expertise is dispersed, it is so difficult to bring it back together.

I have set out some very clear steps for the Government to take. They’re having an “audit” of special schools. This audit must:

Take account of parents’ views, as they are so often ignored

Look at the law, which restricts choice and is biased against special schools

Cover all special schools, in every part of the country

And as I have said, that there should be a moratorium on closing special schools at least until the audit is completed.

Instead, the government has announced that the audit will only look at schools for those with the profoundest needs and disabilities. Yet it is the schools for those with moderate needs that are being closed.

We must make a stand on this issue. We must make a difference on this issue. There are parents up and down this country willing us on. They know what is happening is wrong. They know it can and must be changed. And through the force of our argument we will help make that change.

Challenging bright children, helping those that have fallen behind

One of the things that made people sit up and listen to Labour in 1997 was their promise in the introduction to their Manifesto to set children by ability.

Tony Blair knew that putting that pledge up front would send parents a message – that New Labour was different. That they wouldn’t let egalitarian dogma get in the way of raising school standards.

Tony Blair was right. The trouble is that he’s done nothing about it. Recent research by the academic David Jesson has shown what we already knew – that able students do better when they study together.

The brightest need to be set with their peers, so they can soar.

The struggling need smaller classes with the best teachers so that the difficulty they’re having can be properly addressed.

The government never stops talking about ‘stretch’ – but nothing actually happens.

As well as stretching the brightest and helping those that fall behind, we need to keep children switched on to learning.

One the reasons some young people switch off is that they are bored. At 14 and 15 they would like to learn more skills, but that’s not what is on offer.

This is not just a personal waste – it’s a national waste.

Just 28 per cent of young people in the UK are qualified to apprentice, skilled craft and technician level, compared with 51 per cent in France and 65 per cent in Germany.

If France and Germany are getting vocational education right, why can’t we?

The answer which the Government and much of the educational establishment has come up with is the diploma scheme.

But it seems to me that there is a fundamental flaw at its heart – it entails the death, in any meaningful sense, of the A level.

You should never try to improve something that is weak – vocational education – by scrapping something that is fundamentally strong – like the A level.

If we want to improve vocational education …

….if we want to end the snobbery that has surrounded it …

… if we want to keep these young people switched on to learning …

… and I want to do all of these things …

… then we must take some bold steps.

Surely these must include the following:

Funding vocational courses from 14.

Funding vocational centres that match the best available anywhere in the world.

And establishing a simple set of vocational qualifications that businesses don’t just buy into, but actually design.

The examination system

The fifth and final area is the examination system.

Each August GCSE and A level results come out – and the same thing happens.

The debate between the ‘best results ever’ and “the easiest exams ever” begins.

To avoid this demoralizing slanging match, we need to restore faith in our examinations system. There are real problems.

Students that failed maths A level in 1991 would now get a B. For one exam board last year, you could get an A in Maths GCSE with 45% – get more than half the questions wrong and you still get an A.

There is a simple principle that must be applied. Exams and their results should differentiate clearly between those pupils who excel, those who do well, those who pass and those who fail.

There are various ways to achieve this revaluation. For example, A grades could be reserved for a fixed proportion of students, or marks could be published as well as grades, or both. But I am clear – a revaluation so that parents, employers and students themselves can have confidence in the system must take place.

An overarching principle

So those are the five challenges I believe need urgent attention. But beyond the specifics, there lies a more general problem at the heart of British education.

I don’t yet have a word for it. The best I can do to describe it is to say that it’s a lack of purpose.

Students being told the questions to their exams four weeks before they sit them.

A history curriculum that asks students to wonder how a soldier felt, rather than teaches them about the battles he fought.

An A level paper today found to be almost identical to a CSE paper thirty years ago.

You don’t have to believe every example you read about to know that all too often where there should be clarity, there is fog, where we need rigour, there is fudge.

It is difficult to find a better example than the Professor of continuing education who said the following:

“The great challenge facing education in the 21st Century is the pursuit of a holistic problematised pedagogy.”

Would anyone like me to read that out again?

We should be frank about this.

There has been a deep division in the educational establishment for fifty years – between those that think education is about imparting knowledge, and those that think it is about encouraging children to learn for themselves.

Of course, schools should inspire as well as instill. But when it comes to the basics, we should be blunt: teaching is right, and ‘discussion facilitation’ is wrong.

It is common sense that, especially when very young, children shouldn’t be left to blunder around in the dark.

Rather, they need to be told some basic, essential things.

Discipline, respect for others, responsibility – children aren’t born with restraint: they need to be taught it.

Times tables don’t leap unbidden into a child’s mind: they must be learned, and once learned, as everyone knows, they’re learned for life.

Acquiring knowledge and exploring creatively are linked. But creativity, exploration and self-expression can only come after a child has acquired confidence in using the basic tools of communication, language and number.

It is a special type of cruelty that denies children access to the keys to learning for fear of stifling their creativity. It is only through a thorough grounding in literacy, being taught to read, that children are given the chance to communicate on terms of equality with others.

The ‘learn for yourself’ attitude has been indulged far too much, and that has been to the detriment of the education and lives of children for half a century.

It’s wrong to pretend that children are adults – that they always know what’s best for them. Children won’t necessarily all want to learn to read or to spell – just as when they’re given a choice between chips and pizza or healthy, nutritious food they’re more likely to choose what they like, not what’s good for them.

At its heart, education must be about giving children what is good for them.

Conclusion

I hope that much of what I’ve said tonight is proven to be unnecessary. I hope that in the course of this Parliament, the Government addresses the challenges I’ve identified.

And if they do, we’ll support them every step of the way. The important thing is that it’s done, not who does it.

Because the quality of Britain’s education system today will determine our success as a society tomorrow.

The irony is that many of the problems we face in our education system today have arisen because those responsible for it dislike confrontation.

Fear of confrontation has turned modern education upside down.

We treat children like adults, and teachers like children.

We leave young children to ‘discover things for themselves’ when they need to be taught the basics.

And we spoon feed teenagers, softening the requirements of their exams, when what they need is to be challenged and inspired.

Our education system doesn’t like to say no, and doesn’t like to tell someone that they’ve failed. In the false economy of British education at the start of the twenty first century, the system seems to underestimate the cost of getting things wrong early on.

Well I do understand the importance of teaching all children the basics, of stretching pupils to the best of their abilities, of encouraging ambition and rewarding hard work.

And I want our educational system to deliver all of these things.

It’s common sense.

And like millions of parents across our country, the Conservative Party must stand for it – because we want every child to have the best start in life. We want youngsters to make a success of their careers. And we want to help build a stronger, better Britain.

Below is the text of the speech made by David Cameron on 29th September 2005 to launch his leadership bid.

I’m standing here today because I want to lead the Conservative Party and I want to lead it to victory at the next General Election. Now there are some who say I’m a bit too young. Some who say I’ve just been in Parliament for five years, maybe I don’t have the experience to do the job. And in some ways they’re right. I am only 38 years old, I have only been in Parliament for five years. But I believe that if you’ve got the right ideas in your head and the right passion in your heart, and if you know what this Party needs to do change, then you should go for it.

And that’s why I’m doing it.

There are people who say that the Labour Party under Gordon Brown will move to the left, that the economy’s going to hit the rocks, that all we’ve got to do is wait and just give it one more heave. I think that is rubbish. And I think it would be a pathetic way for a great Party like this to behave.

There are some people who say that we’ve just got to attack the Government with a bit more vigour, we’ve just got to pull them apart a little bit more.

I say that’s wrong. We’ve already called Tony Blair a liar.

The problem at the last election was not that people trusted the Labour Party – they didn’t. They got the lowest level of support for a Government in our political lifetime. The problem was that people don’t yet trust the Conservative Party, and it’s we who have got to change.

There are some people who say it’s just about coming up with more radical policies and putting them forward with more passion and with more vigour. Of course we’ve got to have the right policies, but that alone won’t do it.

At the last election we had lots of good policies. Yesterday, the Government introduced our food policy for schools. Three days ago, they introduced our policy to scrap the revaluation of the council tax. The very day after the election, the Prime Minister stood on the steps of Downing Street, and spoke about respect and virtually introduced our school discipline policy.

It’s not policies alone that are going to do it.

It’s not even, dare I say it, having a young, energetic and vigorous party leader, although come to think of it that wouldn’t be such a bad idea.

It’s not just organisation, it’s not just presentation, it is something much more fundamental.

We have to explain to people what it means to be a Conservative in 2005. We’ve had, frankly, a leadership election that I think has sent half the country to sleep – including some of the people who’ve been taking part in it. We’ve made interesting speeches, we’ve come up with interesting policy ideas, we’ve trotted out that mantra of things that we believe in.

But we’ve got to say what those principles mean in 2005 and how they’ll make a difference to this country in the future.

We talk about personal responsibility. We talk about support for the family. For lower taxes. For limited government. For national sovereignty. But what we have to do is make the change in the culture and identity of the Conservative Party and say what those things mean today, and that’s what I want to do.

Personal responsibility. I believe passionately that people should be free to run their own lives and to choose. But personal responsibility must not mean selfish individualism. There is a we in politics as well as a me.

And when we look at an increasingly atomised society, in which people don’t talk to each other, in our inner cities we have different races living separate lives, we need a shared responsibility – a sense that we’re all in this together. That not just individuals and families have responsibilities, but also government and business.

And that’s why one of the things I’ve put forward is the idea of a School Leaver Programme. To say to people, to say to voluntary bodies and to business and to the Armed Forces – think of a great four month programme that you can put young people through, so that they can do something together, whatever their class, their background, their colour or whatever part of the country they come from.

Lower Taxes. I believe passionately that we should leave people with more of their own money to spend as they choose. But lower taxes cannot mean coming up to an election time with a small bunch of personal tax cuts that just undermine our credibility and make people think that we’re out there to bribe them to vote for us.

Our belief in lower taxes has got to be about making this economy competitive and dynamic and the best place in the world to have jobs and invest and have businesses. We’ve got to have a sense in the Conservative Party, that we want to share – an important word – share the proceeds of growth between better public services on the one hand and lower taxes on the other hand.

Limited Government. I desperately want the State to be our servant and not our master. But rolling back the state must never mean that the weak and defenceless are left behind. That’s why I’ve spoken about a whole new compact with the voluntary sector and social enterprises, to deal with the most difficult problems in our inner cities – with drug dependency, family breakdown, persistent unemployment, poor public space.

In the 1980’s we said to businesses – go to that part of the country where the economy is broken, pay no tax, pay no rates and bring wealth to those areas.

Today we ought to be saying the same to social entrepreneurs – go to that part of the country where society is broken and solve those deep-seated problems that government has consistently failed to solve.

National Sovereignty. I do believe that this country does best when we govern ourselves and we’re proud of our institutions. But national sovereignty must never mean isolation or xenophobia. This is an incredible country with its best days ahead of it.

We should be proud of the fact that we are a leading member of the European Union, of NATO, that we’re on the UN Security Council, that we’re a leading member of the Commonwealth.

And what we must do is show how we can engage ethically and enthusiastically with the rest of the world.

And when the Conservative Party talks about international affairs, it can’t just be Gibraltar and Zimbabwe – we’ve got to show as much passion about Darfur and the millions of people living on less that a dollar a day in sub-Saharan Africa who are getting poorer while we are getting richer.

If we have the courage to explain what each and every one of the Conservative principles that make us Conservatives mean today, then, we can win.

But it is a change of culture and identity. There is no Clause 4, there is no magic wand, there is no one thing that we can do to show that this party thinks Britain’s best days ahead.

It is a change right across the board.

This party has got to look and feel and talk and sound like a completely different organisation.

It’s got to be positive. I want no more by-election campaigns or General Election campaigns when our message is overwhelmingly negative and when we just attack our components.

I want us to be optimistic, talking to peoples’ hopes and not their fears.

And I want us to be a consistent Conservative Party. There are times in this quite new politics we have when Tony Blair sits in the middle of the British political spectrum, when he says or even does Conservative things.

Tuition fees. Foundation hospitals. City academies.

When he does these things, I want a Conservative Party that says yes, that is a good idea, let me show you how to make it even better. Not one that seeks a way of opposing him and just looks opportunistic and insincere.

And we’ve got to change every part of our party, including how we select candidates. Having more women standing for Parliament is not political correctness, it is political effectiveness. If the conversation we have within our own party doesn’t reflect the conversation we’re having with the general public, we won’t win, and we won’t deserve to win.

These are the changes we have to make, and I’m passionate about making them. Because I am fed up of sitting on well-leathered green benches in the House of Commons, and I don’t want to wait another four years of opposition while we make the same mistakes again. I say why put off what has to be done.

I’m fed up with people coming to my surgeries – young mums, who say, I can’t handle this complicated tax credits and benefits system and I can’t get the help I need, what I want is to be floated free, to keep more of my own money as I choose to.

I’m fed up of listening to businessmen, who find the combination of tax and regulation mean it’s not worth investing and growing and giving people jobs.

I don’t want to have to go on hearing from pensioners who can’t pay the council tax and when they see there’s so much waste in government, they know what their hard-earned money is going towards.

This is a practical party – Conservatives are not ideologues but we are idealists.

We do have a dream. A dream of a country where the brightest kid from the poorest household can go to the best university. A dream where it’s the easiest country to set up a business, to employ people, to make money, to invest and to put it back. A dream where we have a stable society in which families who do the right thing, who actually try and work hard and do the right thing for their children are rewarded rather than punished.

But all the dreams in the world won’t come true unless we have the courage to change.

That’s what this leadership election is about. Everyone is now saying we need a modern, compassionate Conservatism. I absolutely believe that is the case, and the choice for the Party has got to be, who do you think really believes it, who will really stick to it? When the going gets tough and the press attacks you after a couple of years and say this isn’t distinctive enough, it isn’t attacking enough, who will dig into their core and say, well that’s what I believe.

I’m not changing just to win, I’m changing because I think it’s right for the country, it’s right for our times, it’s right for a whole generation of people who feel so switched off politics.

So that is the choice we’ve got to make. We can win, we can make this country better, but we can only win if we change. That’s the question I’m asking the Conservative Party. Don’t put it off for four years, go for someone who believes it to the core of their being.

Change to win – and we will win.

Below is the text of the speech made by David Cameron at the Independent Fringe Meeting on 4th October 2004.

You’ve given me 5 minutes.

Let me try it in a sentence.

By emphasising the Conservative values that the vast majority of the British public share, by turning them into Conservative polices – and by showing how we would put them in to action.

In other words: values, policies and action.

Before expanding on that let me say how we don’t win.

We don’t win by a fruitless search for differences between us and our opponents where none really exist. It’s opportunist Punch and Judy politics. It’s unattractive and it doesn’t work.

We have to forget about what Blair is going to say tomorrow or the next day. I don’t know what he’s going to say. He doesn’t know what he is going to say.

We should just get on and do what we think is right.

Second, we won’t win by picking one subject – whether it is Europe or anything else – and talking about it incessantly. People want their political parties to tackle the broad range of issues that they care about. In the main that means schools, hospitals, crime, immigration and the economy.

If you don’t sound balanced, you won’t seem balanced.

Third, we won’t win by being exclusively negative. People now know they have been let down by Labour. We reminded them of that- quite rightly- during the local election campaign. They don’t need anymore reminders from us. And every reminder we send probably says as much about us as it does about them.

It’s time to accentuate the positive…

So, back to the simple formulation – values, policies and action.

Above all we have to recognise that the biggest problem in British politics today is cynicism, apathy and disillusion. They are the enemy, not Labour or the Liberals.

How many times have we all heard on the doorstep – “you’re all the same”, “you won’t make any difference”, ending with the question: “what’s the point?”

Judging from the turn out at general local and by-elections, most people’s answer to that last question – “what’s the point?” – is that there isn’t any.

Labour and the Conservatives are marooned on broadly the same poll rating, somewhere in the low 30s.

They’re there because they’ve let people down. We’re there because people don’t yet think that we will make any difference. The Liberals are doing well, more than anything else, because they are not either of us.

But I’m upbeat.

There are three questions that matter in terms of political success.

Do people share your values?

Do they agree with you about what’s wrong?

And do they think you have the right plans for doing something about it?

The answer to the first question about values is good for the Conservatives. Why else do you think the focus group obsessed Labour party has been so timid?

Should crime be punished or tolerated? Does Britain do best when it is control of its own destiny?

Are families the key building block of a stable society? Does equality of opportunity matter more than equality of outcome? Are our institutions a source of strength not a cause of weakness?

Should we encourage people to do more for themselves when they can?

All value questions – and all get a Conservative answer almost anywhere in the country you care to ask them.

Answers to questions about what is wrong in Blair’s Britain are just as encouraging.

Here I admit, we’ve checked with polls and focus groups.

Do people think that crime is rising and the hands of the Police are tied by bureaucracy and paperwork? Yes.

Do people think that hospital managers and head teachers are too busy looking up to Whitehall to manage effectively? Yes.

Do people feel over taxed and in awe of third term tax rises and a £2,000 council tax. Yes. They don’t just think these taxes are coming if Labour win again – they know they are coming.

So that brings us to the big one – “do people agree with our plans?”

First, they don’t know enough – if anything at all – about them.

Second, even if they do, because of the wall of cynicism and disillusion, they don’t believe we will achieve them.

That’s why the Timetable of Action being published this week is so important. It will tell you what we will do in the first day, the first week, the first month.

It gives you details of the first queen’s speech and the first budget. It is about being accountable.

It is about people feeling that they are in charge again, and not the politicians. To make sure we are the servants, not the masters.

Two last points.

Does the Conservative party need to modernise itself?

Yes, of course. If you don’t understand the complexities and changing nature of modern society you are irrelevant.

If you don’t address the modern concerns of a modern country, you are dead.

Second, by saying that most people in this country share broadly Conservative values, have I said enough?

No. We have to make sure that we include all of those values.

That we have a vision of society. That we believe we have obligations unto each other. That there is a net beneath which no one should fall. That there is a “we” as well as a “me”.

As I look at a Labour Government that is closing special schools for disabled children, that is throwing wardens out of sheltered accommodation schemes, that endlessly threatens community hospitals, that offers drug addicts the sort of treatment place that is worse than useless and that crushes the voluntary and charitable sectors with its belief that “Society is the State” – nothing more, nothing less – there has never been a greater need for Conservatives to explain our view of society, our obligations to each other and our compassion for those in need.

And with everything I’ve said – I hope we can inject some passion – as well as compassion – into what we say at the same time.

So how do we win?

Values, policies and action.

Who knows? If we follow this with passion as well as discipline, people might just listen.