Cameron set to rebut Labour claim

10:09pm Tuesday 30th September 2008

David Cameron will use his keynote speech to the Conservative conference on Wednesday to rebut Labour's claim that his lack of "experience" makes him unfit to lead the country through a time of crisis.

And he will portray Gordon Brown as an obstacle to the change which is needed to rebuild the economy and repair Britain's "broken society".

Rather than the experience which the Prime Minister boasts of, it is "character and judgment" which are needed to get the UK through its financial difficulties and take the right decisions for the long term, he will say, in comments implicitly inviting voters to make a choice between the personalities of the two party leaders.

Mr Cameron offered his party's full cooperation with Government on legislation designed to restore stability to the financial sector after the collapse of a string of banks and the rejection of George Bush's 700 billion dollar US bank bail-out plan by Congress.

But he is set to insist that this suspension of political hostilities does not mean holding back on criticism of the Government's mistakes and the Prime Minister's failings which he believes have contributed to the financial chaos.

Mr Brown used his own speech at Labour's conference in Manchester last week to direct a barb at Mr Cameron's lack of experience, arguing that the current period of global economic instability means it is "no time for a novice" to take the helm of the Government.

Mr Cameron will respond by telling Tory activists gathered in Birmingham: "To do difficult things for the long term, or even to get us through the financial crisis in the short term, it's not experience we need, it's character and judgment.

"To rebuild our economy, it's not more of the same we need, but change. To repair our broken society, it's not more of the same we need, but change.

"Experience is the argument of the incumbent over the ages. Experience is what they always say when they try to stop change."

Mr Cameron's crucial conference speech has been significantly rewritten over the course of the last day in response to fast-moving events. Instead of the assault on the Labour Government's record which he was expected to unleash in a bid to put a halt to the bounce in the polls enjoyed by Mr Brown since his own well-received speech in Manchester, Mr Cameron will devote much of his address to setting out the measures he believes are necessary to restore stability in the financial sector.

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