Jonathan Reed: PM in step with power, then it's back to the unpacking

LIKE thousands of families who have just moved house, David Cameron will spend the weekend surrounded by boxes waiting to be unpacked.

But Downing Street is not just any new house. Not only is he having to get used to living in one of the most famous properties in the world, but Mr Cameron is also having to contend with the "strange noises" of living in the heart of London.

"The first night is always a bit strange, a new bed and so on," he

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says. "And in the middle of London you've got Big Ben and all these other clocks going off every hour."

He puts on a brave face and says he will get used to it. It's the least of his worries.

With the Cameron family's move having been carried out in the glare of the world's media, Britain's youngest Prime Minister for nearly 200

years admits unpacking may take time.

But he leaves no doubt who will be boss of the house – pregnant wife Samantha – although he prides himself on having successfully plugged one of his hi-tech gadgets into the speaker system.

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Asked whether he will be spending the weekend unpacking boxes, he confesses: "There's a lot of that going on at the moment. I try to stay out of it. My wife's in charge."

Less than three weeks after answering the Queen's request to form a Government – albeit the first coalition in 65 years – Mr Cameron is on the train heading north to Yorkshire, a region he visited six times during the month-long election campaign, to make his first major speech about the economy.

Happily agreeing to pose for a photograph with a member of the train's staff and waving to passengers peering through the carriage window at a station, he is far more relaxed than his predecessor ever was on such visits, even if he has inherited an economy in crisis and had to announce 6.2bn of spending cuts this week.

He is heading north because he wanted to "get out of London, get out of the bubble", particularly given that his speech was about the need to rebalance the economy. On the seat behind him is his Liberal Democrat Business Secretary Vince Cable – a man he lauded as an "absolute star" to civil servants but who appears to be at odds with many in Mr Cameron's party over the Government's plans to raise capital gains tax.

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Although this week saw both the Queen's Speech and Mr Cameron's prime ministerial debut in the House of Commons, it was the scope of the efficiency savings – including significant cuts for councils, regional development agencies and the end of Child Trust Funds and the job-creating Future Jobs Fund – that has, perhaps, had the greatest significance.

He brushes off questions over why he had to resort to real cuts rather than the promised package of efficiencies – "We promised 6bn would be found and we found it" – and insists they will still be found, although it may take longer than expected to root them out.

"But I've never claimed efficiencies alone would do the job of reducing the deficit," he says. "There are clearly going to be some difficult decisions and we shouldn't hide from that. I don't hide from that.

"There will be a proper process, a proper spending review that will take place throughout the summer and into the autumn then we will have to make some difficult announcements about spending decisions for the next few years.

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"It was important to do something in-year to show we were getting to grips with the problem. Obviously there are going to be some difficult decisions but we want to try to take the country with us, we want to make sure we protect the most vulnerable."

Conscious voters in some parts of Yorkshire still harbour resentment dating back to policies from the Thatcher era that left some communities devastated, Mr Cameron insists he is not "targeting" any region, and cities will soon get their own Minister to speak up for them.

Yesterday's speech was all about curtailing the dominance of the City, and encouraging manufacturing and investment in those English regions that still lag behind the prosperous South-East.

"In fact, we think it's very important as we get spending under control the regions are helped, and we find ways of making sure we get a good, strong- growing private sector in all the regions of our country," he says.

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"So we're looking at ways we can do that. It's very early days, very early work but we're not going to stand by and see regions face difficulty because difficult spending decisions have to be made.

"We'll look at ways of offsetting that, ameliorating that, of helping those regions. Everyone knows we need to have strong private-sector led recoveries in every part of the country. We'll make sure that happens."

Mr Cameron denies he will abandon industrial activism – an approach embraced by Labour to give state support to industry, such as Sheffield Forgemasters, where it could attract further investment – altogether, although he says the previous administration was "active in the wrong way" by imposing too many rules and regulations and that stifled private enterprise.

Despite the challenges facing him – keeping together a Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition which is already experiencing grumbling on both backbenches – he insists he is "fairly calm about life".

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One of the most striking features about the historic arrangement has been the personal chemistry between the Prime Minister and his deputy, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg, the Sheffield Hallam MP. Their joint appearance in the sunshine of Downing Street's Rose Garden a fortnight ago was remarkable for the apparently genuine warmth of a relationship between two men who had been at each other's throats for the previous two years.

"We've got a good personal relationship which is going to be very important," he says. "Coalitions will only really work if you are able to resolve your differences through dispassionate co-operation and I think we find each other perfectly reasonable human beings to get on with."

Reflecting on his first weeks as Prime Minister, he says: "It's a hugely challenging job, it's a very daunting prospect, but I'm pleased we've created a strong, stable government, the coalition is working well and decisions are being taken.

"What I aspire to is a government of quiet effectiveness that doesn't have that sort of hysterical kind of need to respond to media headlines every day of the week."

For now, it's back to the boxes. Or seeing what Samantha has done with them.

Joanthan Reed is the Yorkshire Post's Political Editor.