DAVID CAMERON made his first speech at a Conservative party conference as Prime Minister yesterday but it came at the end of his toughest few days since he took the job in May.
Mr Cameron has come in for some serious flak from his most loyal media allies after his chancellor George Osborne announced that child benefit would no longer be paid to higher-rate taxpayers, as of 2013.
The Daily Telegraph called the policy "crass and out of touch" while the Mail referred to a "growing backlash" over the cut.
In its leading article, the Mail also stated: "What we are emphatically not prepared to accept without protest is that the political class should yet again discriminate against one-earner families".
That discrimination refers to the fact that a single parent, or a family in which only one parent works, earning £44,000-a-year will lose their child benefit but a couple both earning £43,000 - ie. £86,000 combined - will not.
Unsurprisingly, this has called the practicalities of the cut into question. While polls show that the policy is overwhelmingly supported, only 41% of people agreed the above circumstance is fair against 46% who think the policy should be based on a proper means-test.
But the worst aspect of the Tories' handling of the situation was that the general furore seemed to cause outright panic and policy on the hoof.
On the night following Mr Osborne's speech, Tory children's minister Tim Loughton told Channel 4 news: "If there are ways we can look at compensating measures for those genuinely in need that will be looked at in future budgets.
"If the thresholds need to be adjusted there's plenty of time to look at that."
His interview brought a welcoming response from backbench MP Margot James who wrote on her Twitter: "Very good to hear Tim Loughton confirm child benefit proposal needs to be revised."
But Mr Loughton then used his Twitter account to suggest people were "overexcited over child benefit comments", adding: "Of course, I'm not calling for a review."
In the end, Mr Cameron himself had to step in and explain that the introduction of a tax-break for married couples from 2015 would compensate families affected by the cut.
However, that move would not help high-earning single parents or unmarried couples and the whole episode smacks of panicked backtracking last seen by the Labour government after the 10p tax rate debacle.
In his hour-long keynote speech, Mr Cameron listed that and several other failings by the previous administration but he devoted most of his time to his preoccupation with creating a so-called Big Society.
This is despite the fact that the whole policy is still too vague and, indeed, blamed by many Tories for their failure to gain a majority at the last election.
One of the critics is outgoing deputy chairman Lord Ashcroft whose 133-page-book Minority Verdict examines the Conservatives' failure to do better against such an unpopular incumbent government.
"There was a tentative hope that the attractive new leader really did represent the prospect of a better government offering real change," Lord Ashcroft wrote.
"This, though, was tempered by suspicions about lack of substance, concerns that the party was for the better-off rather than ordinary people and a residual fear that the change had been merely cosmetic".
Of course, the majority of Conservative supporters are hardly depressed about the current situation.
As the senior partner in the coalition, the Tories have been able to make much more of an impression than the Liberal Democrats. The fact that a poll of party members shows 84% support the coalition comes as no surprise.
The Conservatives are also doing well in the polls as an individual party, seeing off Ed Miliband's Labour bounce with their own increase to 43%, up from the 36% scored at the election in May.
With the party conference season now over, that could all change especially when the coalition announces a whole raft of cuts in the spending review on 20th October.
The Tories must hope they handle any backlash better than they did over the past few days.
For Mr Cameron will be well aware that this was very much a case of the calm before the storm.
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