The Wardman Wire

There is usually some sort of debate this time year about who has the advantage going in to the conference season in terms of order. Every year it is the smaller parties first, such as UKIP and the sort, then the Lib Dems, followed by Labour and then concluding with the Conservatives. The order never changes. It doesn’t seem to bother the parties much as the Lib Dems seem to accept it and relish the chance to set the agenda (though rarely do!) and Labour and Tories seem pretty happy with it too. But do any parties have an advantage?

Well last year the Tories had a massive advantage – though only in hindsight. Had the Tories gone first, Cameron would have faced a very difference and more hostile conference and we may also have had an election after the Labour conference as Labour would probably still be riding high on the Brown bounce. As it happened Brown went first, played it badly, Cameron gave the speech of his life, the Tories united and the rest, as they say, is history.

Well this year the tables have turned. Labour got fantastic coverage last week. Brown was widely seen as making a good speech and made his position a little safer, for now at least. All in all it was good headlines for the governing party and that was reflected in the mini-bounce in the polls.

This week has been entirely overshadowed by events in America and the economic world. Osborne’s good speech yesterday was more of an afterthought in both the evening news and next day’s papers. The news agencies have demoted the Tories in the priority stakes and I suspect it will damage them somewhat.

Cameron needs a quieter day tomorrow news-wise and also needs to make some headlines himself. Otherwise Labour’s good week last week could well turn in to a very good month.