Tories 'must do more' to convince voters

Tory leader David Cameron conceded today that his party had more work to do to win over voters as opinion polls suggested his lead over Labour was fuelled far more by discontent with Labour than approval of his own policies.

But he insisted that the party had changed under his leadership and was using its annual conference in Manchester this week to show the country the Conservatives were focused on “the poorest and the most vulnerable”.

A Populus survey for today’s Times found that 68% still believed the Tories had not changed much under Mr Cameron and were enjoying a revival “mainly just because the Labour Government has become so unpopular”. That was just two points down on a year ago.

That echoed another poll, by ORB for BBC Newsnight, which found that 64% of those intending to vote Tory were doing so “mainly” in protest against either the incumbent party or against Prime Minister Gordon Brown personally.

Mr Cameron told BBC Breakfast: “Some very important things have changed.

“If we win the next election, instead of having 19 Conservative women MPs, we will have 60; instead of having just two MPs from black and ethnic minority backgrounds, we will have 12.

“The whole emphasis of this week is about helping the poorest and most vulnerable. That is why we are reforming education, that’s why we are getting to grips with the deficit, that’s why we want to end the inequalities in the health system.

“So I do not accept the party has not changed. We do have to do more to convince people that we are the right people to take on the country’s challenges.”

Meanwhile shadow chancellor George Osborne was today set to unveil a “comprehensive” package of austerity measures on pay, pensions and benefits to bring down Britain’s record £175bn (€189bn) deficit.

In a bold measure that risks alienating millions of voters currently in their 50s, Mr Osborne is to warn that a planned rise in the state pension age from 65 to 66 must be brought forward by up to a decade to 2016.

The move would allow him to reduce Britain’s borrowing by £13bn (€14bn) a year as a Tory government grapples with the nation’s dire finances, the shadow chancellor was to say during his

keynote speech on the second day of the Conservative Party conference in Manchester.

But his announcement threatened to be overshadowed by Chancellor Alistair Darling’s move last night to impose a salary freeze on 750,000 of the UK’s best-paid public servants.