A fired up David Cameron gives his best speech yet at Conservative conference

It got a bit flowery at the end and strayed dangerously close to Richard Curtis Notting Hill Territory (I am just a Prime Minister standing in front of his country and asking it to love him - or words to that effect), but I think it is fair to say that was the best speech I have seen David Cameron give in the decade I have been reporting on him.

In recent years, his conference speeches have become a bit lacklustre, as if he was a man who was enjoying power but couldn't really remember why he had wanted it in the first place (Ed Miliband sounded, by contrast, an awful lot fresher). But the Prime Minister appeared fired up today, even, on issues like the NHS and what he claimed were Labour lies, really quite angry.

His old friend Steve Hilton was more involved in the preparation of the speech this year and it showed. The rhetorical passages were, by and large, effective where they needed to be and the announcements on tax (pledges to raise the personal allowance by another £2,000 and raise the 40p tax threshold massively to £50,000) potential game changers.

For all that he disparaged Ed Miliband, you could almost take it as a compliment to Labour in general; he and his party expect this election to be very close.