The 'Heirs to Blair' theme of current Conservative thinking is further reinforced today.  Former News of the World editor, Andy Coulson is going to try to do for the Conservatives what Alastair Campbell did for New Labour.

Michael Howard is well known to be angry at Cameron's grammar schools policy.  What will he think therefore of this move? In case you didn't catch it, the Newsnight confrontation between Howard and Alastair Campbell is still available for viewing on the BBC2 website (click forward 57 minutes for the good stuff).

The most interesting take on all this in today's papers comes from former Number 10 Spin Doctor, Lance Price in The Telegraph ('Cameron needs a media strategy')  In it Price explains that Cameron is doing well on the presentation front already, but the vision and strategy are lacking.

He isn't wholly persuasive in his arguments.  He claims New Labour prior to 1997 put forward coherent messages about what they were for, not just what they were against.

By doing that, New Labour kept all but a tiny minority of their traditional supporters on board and built a coalition of support that proved unstoppable.

My recollection of 1997 probably differs from Lance Prices in a number of ways.  But I seem to recall New Labour doing a very good job at bashing John Major's government and not such a great job at proposing an alternative vision any greater than the 5 pledges on the back of a credit card.

Also in today's news

There was considerable interest in the movements of the British housing market earlier this week with the Daily Express and Daily Mail leading with diametrically opposing front pages ('House prices still soaring' in the Express and 'Is the house price boom over' in the Mail) For an authoritative view have a look at The Economist ('Fighting over their castles')  Nothing particularly new, but a typically robust overview that you would expect from that magazine.