Politicians of every stripe are notorious for their lack of ability to solve the deep-seated problems of our societies. However, sometimes they are able to state the problem clearly. On July 7, Conservative party leader David Cameron spoke in Glasgow on behalf of his party's national candidate there.

What he said about morality makes a lot of good sense. He stated: "We have seen a decades-long erosion of responsibility, of social virtue, of self-discipline, respect for others . . . Instead we prefer moral neutrality, a refusal to make judgments about what is good and bad behaviour, right and wrong behaviour.

"Bad. Good. Right. Wrong. These are words that our political system and our public sector scarcely use anymore . . .Refusing to use these words— right and wrong—means a denial of personal responsibility and the concept of moral choice . . . There is a danger of becoming quite literally a de-moralised society, where nobody will tell the truth anymore about what is good and bad, right and wrong.

"That is why children are growing up without boundaries, thinking they can do as they please, and why no adult will intervene to stop them—including, often, their parents. The values needed to repair our broken society and build a strong society are values that should be taught in the home, in the family. I want a mandate for restoring responsibility to our society, to call time on the twisted values that have eaten away at our social fabric" (excerpts from text of East Glasgow speech, emphasis added).

During his speech Cameron said nothing directly about God, Jesus Christ, the Bible, the Christian religion or any other religion for that matter. But his words about morality were generally based on the Judeo-Christian ethic. They ring true, not applying just to the United Kingdom but to the entire Western world and especially the English-speaking peoples around the globe.

Afterwards Cameron suffered caustic verbal punishment from members of the liberal press and the intelligentsia behind it. His words did not fit with their amoral stance on basic issues governing morality. But regardless of whether his political party can or would carry out a program designed to repair British society should it ever become the ruling government again, what he said in Glasgow remains fundamentally true.