This has risks. Some of these organisations will fail. Some of the charismatic local figures will abscond with the takings. Britain has grown accustomed to the Whitehall system of universal provision and rigorous bookkeeping. Much of that provision is -second-rate and many of the bookkeepers are merely chronicling the disbursement of waste, but the new arrangements will not automatically command public confidence.

Then again, Cameron has proved his skill at winning political battles. If Thatcher had a failing, it was her tendency to invert suaviter in modo, fortiter in re. She often talked tougher than she acted, appearing hostile to state provision while increasing government spending at rates that should have impressed social democrats: running a well-funded blood transfusion service while sounding like Count Dracula. As a result, Tory cuts passed into mythology, although they were indeed a myth. The only cuts were in the Tory vote.

Conservative governments have always spent money on social services. Yet they have often been caricatured as hard-faced men who do well out of grinding down the poor. If Cameron had started his leadership by announcing dramatic changes to welfare and education, the caricature would have been revived. As it is, he has persuaded enough voters that when he talks about welfare and education, he deserves a respectful hearing.

When Thatcher hired Ferdinand Mount as an adviser, she said: "This is my real task, to restore standards of conduct and responsibility. Otherwise we shall simply be employing more and more policemen on an increasingly hopeless task." Her task has now been passed on to Cameron, who insists that he is "going to be as radical a social reformer as Mrs Thatcher was an economic reformer, and radical social reform is what this country needs right now". Anyone who thinks of him or herself as a Thatcherite should wish him every success.