Osborne finds the Tories more enthusiastic about the coalition than they were a year ago








A recurring observation on this blog during last year's party conference season was that audiences at the Liberal Democrat and Conservative party conferences were rather lukewarm about the coalition government they had just formed (see below). This was indicated by the fact that applause for mentions of it tended to be either delayed or failed to reach the 'normal' 8 seconds burst (or both) - e.g. HERE and HERE.

But in George Osborne's speech earlier today, there was evidence of a greater willingness among Conservative party activists to show their approval of the coalition than they were at this time a year ago.

When the Chancellor commended the Liberal Democrats for "working as a coalition together in the national interest" (about 30 seconds into the above clip) the audience not only started clapping more or less straight away, but they also managed to keep it going for a healthy 10 seconds.

P.S. Blimey!
Since posting the above, I've just discovered that the whole speech can now be embedded from the BBC website - so serious anoraks can now watch it from beginning to end:









Conference season 2011 blogging update:
Last year's conference season posts:

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