In less than a month, the Conservatives will descend on Manchester for their annual party conference.

The decision to come here was taken years ago. So here’s an interesting question: if David Cameron knew then what he knows now, would he still want his party to gather in our fair city?

The political winds have shifted greatly since the Conservatives last visited in 2009. Then, Mr Cameron could do little wrong. His party was on the front foot, heading towards a general election; his troops, the scent of victory in their nostrils, were obedient; he had a cumbersome and inflexible target, in the form of Gordon Brown.

A painstaking charm offensive meant that even in Manchester – a place that has resolutely refused to elect a single Tory councillor for nearly 25 years – he could expect a fair hearing. He could come up, praise the city’s regeneration, nod sympathetically as he shared a mug of tea with single mums at a SureStart centre, and chat breezily about his love of the Smiths.

Well, that was when he was, in electoral terms, hopelessly poor. And in those days – to paraphrase Morrissey – Manchester liked him more.

When the prime minister arrives on October 2, the signs of the changed mood will be everywhere.

Thousands of public-sector workers have promised to greet him at the gates in protest. In the conference centre itself, just months ago, hundreds of council workers queued up to sign off on their town hall careers – the victims of eye-watering government spending cuts.

The city’s left-leaning Liberal Democrat group, wiped out at the last local elections, are more likely to throw him evil glances than cheery waves.

And that’s not the half of it. If Mr Cameron is under pressure from without, he is also being squeezed from within.

Inside the hall, the discontent may be more subtle – but it will be there. The Conservatives are currently languishing six points behind Labour, under a still-unconvincing Ed Miliband. The voices of the right are becoming bolder. The whispers about Mr Cameron's ‘failings’ – on stalled health reform, on the retention of the 50p tax rate for top earners – are becoming audible mutterings. And Tory conference delegates have a habit of speaking their minds when they get the microphone, however much the wonks and planners try to airbrush proceedings.

Such disquiet must have Mr Cameron tearing out his hair. It is barely a year since his party emerged victorious – or at least semi-victorious – in a general election for the first time since 1992. It is as if a brief whiff of power has made grumbling backbenchers forget how much meticulous work went into rehabilitating the Tories’ image, winning over the middle ground, and making them electable again.

Then there is Nick Clegg. The deputy prime minister seems to have finally changed tack as far as the coalition is concerned. The early days – when he stood side-by-side with Mr Cameron, literally as well as metaphorically – proved hugely damaging to his party’s prospects. He allowed himself to become a political lightning rod. By conspicuously supporting everything the government did – including, ludicrously, a position on university tuition fees that was diametrically opposed to the one on which the Lib Dems fought the election – he painted himself as a well-meaning but naïve stooge.

Now, however, Mr Clegg seems to have grasped that less is often more. He is speaking out less, supporting less vocally, and generally keeping his head down. This has allowed his spinners to subtly change the Cameron-Clegg ‘story’. No longer are they best buddies; now, Lib Dems say, their leader is a man who will still try to be constructive, but is prepared to veto anything he doesn’t like.

As a tactic, it hasn’t yet seen voters return to the Lib Dems. But it has increasingly turned the spotlight back on the prime minister.

It’s a fair bet, then, that the David Cameron we see next month will be a little less cheerful and a little more careworn than the 2009 version. The luxury of opposition is that you can, to some extent, be all things to all people. That isn’t possible when you are the one making the big decisions.

If Mr Cameron is smart, he will keep his eyes fixed on the future. For it won’t be the grumbling backbenchers who decide his fate. It won’t be the unions, and it won’t be Mr Clegg.

No: the Conservatives’ prospects at the next election depend almost entirely on the economy.

They have gambled everything on a recovery in time for 2015. If by then we are back in the black, Mr Cameron and George Osborne will get the vast majority of the credit, and should be able to plan for a second term unencumbered by the compromises of coalition. They should have the power – and possibly money – to shape the country in whatever way they choose.

If the country is still in the mire, the odds are they are finished.

It’s one hell of a gamble. Recent polls suggest the voters are getting increasingly queasy about the cuts that have happened, and the cuts still to come. Only 38 per cent say the government should stick to its deficit-reducing course; 36 per cent say it should prioritise growth. About 50-50, then.
Red or black? The wheel is already spinning.

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