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It's Wednesday in Manchester. What are we fixing today?

Broken politics? That was Monday.

Broken economy? George Osborne was pretty open about his plans on that one yesterday.

It must be the broken society. Can we fix it? Yes, we can. Prepare for policy plans on criminal justice, redressing the balance as the Conservatives see it between the rights of the criminal and the rights of those communities who suffer because of them. It's familiar territory that will appeal to those sitting in the conference hall, one or two perhaps feeling slightly wobbly after yesterday's lesson in honesty from the Shadow Chancellor.

They boy, they believe, did good. But did he HAVE to be photographed drinking bubbly and did he HAVE to be SO honest about pay freezes and delayed pensions? Isn't there a danger, they might worry this morning, that people say they accept the need to take a hit but when it comes to putting a cross in a box, that they'll see themselves still turning up at 9.00am in their suit and tie when they're 66 and simply despair ... And think again?

There is of course. That's why the speech was a gamble but honesty, the party faithful have decided, was a good move. Come a day that is the day after a Conservative victory in the General Election, then honesty won't just have proved to be good. It'll have proved to be crucial. It'll be the moment Mr Osborne can say that he told us so and it'll be the moment he can point to that all important 'm' - a mandate.

As I left the conference hall this morning after an early shift, I bumped into George Osborne. At least I bumped into a man - a man from the Mirror I assume - who was trying to serve him with a glass of champagne on a silver platter. The Mirror man was all dressed up for the occasion. The Shadow Chancellor's rattled minders made sure he had nowhere to go.

Mr Osborne himself kept his cool and carried on with a round of live television interviews persuading us that we're all of us "in this together".

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