Unfortunately both sounded very weak talking about tax - both left the chilli and dipped into the guacomole. Davis bizarrely mentioned the Irish republics 30 year plan; Cameron put the brakes on after saying lower taxes would help industry - for fear of sounding too dry.

In a similar manner, none of them got to grips with Europe. Cameron clearly doesn’t rate it as an issue, Davis kept to the sticking-an-oar in policy of disruption.

To their credit, they didn’t waste time on immigration, so they have learnt something.

Davis forked both Cameron and Blair on spin with some venom - what he needs to consider is whether a potential Tory leader should be spending time deconstructing New Labour mechanics.

Cameron launched into a long spiel about drugs that would have confused the most blathering Liberal Democrat.

Davis relaxed chatty style was good, but he tends not to use sound bites; this makes it difficult to summarize any of his views. Sadly he needs to learn a bit from Goebbels. Say less, and repeat it.

It’s not about changing policy because, in some key areas of concern to the electorate, Blair has aped Major. Tory policies have been head and shoulders better than New Labour in 2001 and 2005 - what the party needs is a better image as hollow as that sounds to those of us who believe in policy-led politics.

David Cameron, for all his policy flaws, offers euroscepticism with a fresh and non-nasty face. David Davis does not.

Yes, they seem to be fixing it by bringing in crazy ‘anti-terror measures’ and ID cards and the like. In time this will ensure that there are more asylum seekers from Britain than vice versa. Amnesty International are already warming up their engines.

I haven’t a clue, but since the newspapers haven’t been talking about it for months, I suspect that the average Briton has a hazy sense that it’s all ok now.

If the newspapers talk about ‘change in Tory party’ - as they are doing now - for long enough, then the average voter will come away with a hazy sense that we have changed. And that would be all we’d need to overcome this visceral dislike the voters have for us.

Crudely, the voter’s don’t dislike us because of our policies, they dislike us because they think we’re bastards. Moving on for the Conservatives means showing somehow that, look, we’re alright really.

It’s not enough to win an election, but it’s enough to remove the big thing that’s stops us.