James Forsyth James Forsyth

Fight or flight

This is the time for Cameron to push through radical measures. Any delay, and all will be lost

issue 20 August 2011

David Cameron now has the chance to be the Prime Minister he always wanted to be. Up to now, his premiership has, to his frustration, been dominated by the economic crisis that the country is facing. His cherished social reform agenda has not been the government’s animating mission but a rhetorical extra. But after last week’s riots, this has all changed. Broke Britain is now being forced to share its space at the top of the national agenda with Cameron’s specialist subject, Broken Britain.

This crisis may have deprived Cameron of his summer holiday but it has given him back his political mission. Those present at the meeting in Downing Street before Cameron addressed parliament last Thursday say the mood was remarkably upbeat. There was no resentment about being dragged back from their villas to their desks; no angst or panicking about a country in chaos. Instead, there was a confidence that the Prime Minister was playing on his home turf.

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