From the Conservative conference

The gaffe-prone Andrew Lansley has done it again. At the start of his speech this afternoon, the shadow health secretary declared:

I'm looking forward to 2010. We've got the team, we've got the captain . . . I think we're really going to win this time. But you know, I'm not just thinking about the World Cup, I'm thinking about the general election.

Lansley's casual triumphalism is the antithesis of the sober, businesslike attitude that David Cameron has encouraged his party to adopt. This year, after Lansley let slip the Conservative plan to cut public spending by 10 per cent in most Whitehall departments, a source in Cameron's office told ConservativeHome that "no one is unsackable . . . [Lansley] will not be forgiven another gaffe."

After this latest gaffe, it's even more likely that Lansley will follow Alan Duncan out of the shadow cabinet before the election.