Nick Gibb, Tory MP for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton, accuses his party today of incoherence. While his point is generally true (particularly over tax) he himself betrays some confusion.

He doesn't like the emerging message of decentralisation, arguing that it paradoxically leads government to impose targets and central contol. He's muddling up contracting services out to the market -- the old Tory policy adopted so disastrously by Labour -- with the Tories' fledgling voucher policy, along with their aim to get politics out of the public services and make them accountable instead to the public.

There's a long way to go before this approach is properly thought through, not least in policing where Oliver Letwin's plan to make the police accountable to localy elected mayors and police boards begs the question of local political control. But this is a genuinely big idea, and if the Tories have the wit and courage (big if!) to develop it properly, it will be a winner.