Those who read my article about the British Conservative Party last week or are otherwise interested in the leadership race may be interested to hear what happened at the Party Conference last week. The conference, normally a stage-managed affair setting out Tory policy for a wide audience, became an exercise in party democracy, with each candidate getting a big speech to make their case to the MPs, party members and the country as a whole.

Coming into the conference, the received wisdom was that the race was David Davis’ to lose and that Ken Clarke would be his big challenger. Clarke did reasonably well, attacking Tony Blair and his likely successor Gordon Brown, but his performance was overshadowed by a barnstorming performance by young David Cameron, who wowed just about everyone with this speech. The next day, David Davis was, to say the least, lackluster, confirming the reservations about his ability to impress I expressed in my article. His speech, however, was full of good stuff and can be read here. DD’s misfortune was compounded when he was followed by yet another excellent speech from Dr. Liam Fox, who articulated a strong conservative case and was the only one of the main candidates to address the Iraq War, pointedly asking those who were now opposing it just how the world would be better with Saddam still in power.

By the end of the conference, there were many mutterings that David Davis had blown it and that Cameron had eclipsed both him and Clarke to become the clear front-runner. There are also suggestions that many MPs who are publicly supporting DD may now vote for Fox as the real standard-bearer of conservative tradition.

Confirming the Cameron-Fox ascendency, fans of Frank Luntz may be interested to see his focus group for the BBC here (although be quick as the BBC will replace it with something else this week). Cameron was the big winner, in a fashion Frank says he has never seen in politics. Liam was the only other candidate to register positively, and in a manner his campaign team will be very encouraged by.

I suspect that the momentum is building for the MPs to vote David Cameron into the shortlist of two they will send to the membership, where he will be joined by either a tremendously weakened David Davis or a surging Liam Fox. If Cameron faces Davis, then Cameron will win without question in my opinion. If Cameron faces Fox, then the party will have a genuine leadership contest between two talented, young and charismatic individuals each with their own interpretation of conservatism well within the traditions of the party. At the moment, the future is looking good for conservatism in the UK. At last.