The Conservative leader David Cameron has outlined his plans for tackling poverty and inequality in a speech at the Guardian's headquarters. Making the sixth annual Hugo Young memorial lecture, Cameron said Labour's "big government" has "squeezed out" individuals' sense of civic responsibliity. Instead of big government, Cameron's Conservatives want a 'big society' in which civic responsibility and duty are central. The state would not simply step back; it would play an active role in "remaking society".
Columnist Michael White says this was a direct appeal for support from traditional Labour supporters for whom the fight against poverty and inequality are vitally important.
Fellow Guardian commentator Jackie Ashley says some of the criticism of Cameron's Tory conference speech appears to have stung, as this speech saw him row back from the anti-state position he outlined back then.
Save the Children's director of UK programme Fergus Drake says it's too early to say whether Cameron's plan to cut poverty will work, and expresses disappointment that cutting child poverty by 2020 was an "aspiration" for the Tories and not a commitment.
Columnist Jonathan Freedland gives his assessment of how David Cameron would have been viewed by the late Hugo Young, the Guardian's senior political commentator and chairman of the Scott Trust, which owns the paper.
