Kelly Johnson is unemployed and wants to study. Yet fundamental changes in the benefits system this week will make this virtually unworkable for the 21-year-old hairdressing student, and for at least 80,000 jobless people like her. He argues: "Not even in the Disneyland of right-wing Conservatism do they think it wise to rock the boat at this conference.". The exception is Jerry "Gabby" Hayes, talkative as his Hollywood B-movie mentor, who not only thinks that the Government can win the election, but also believes the hard-hats will keep quiet.

This is their last opportunity to step down the catwalk before the poll that counts.Since it is virtually political suicide to do so, Tory MPs will not go public on their hunches. Hardliners want John Major to "cut through his ministers' private agendas" and pledge in his conference speech on Friday that no government he leads will scrap the pound and sign up for the euro.Mr Major's spin-doctors insist that "apart from a bit of intellectual positioning on the fringe", the leadership contenders are not going to display themselves in Bournemouth Fat chance. The Chancellor has infuriated Eurosceptics with his mildly-encouraging noises about a single European currency and the possibility that a Tory government might join the first wave of participating countries in 1999. He unveils his manifesto today in Conservative Way Forward, the hard-right journal with a busty blonde on the cover (excuse? she is sitting on a seaside rock alongside "clear blue water"), arguing: "If we had another great tax cutting Budget we will go up in the polls."The Great Clarke Issue is the other item on the unpublished agenda. He plans a frantic fringe, talking on Tuesday about Winning the Election, the day after at a News International-sponsored event on Globalisation, and speaking to a Yorkshire Conservative Political Centre breakfast on Thursday on a Europe of Nations.In between times, he has a full diary of meals with influential media folk, when he is not kinnocking from one television studio to another. Much the same is said of Gillian Shephard, the Education Secretary.The Vulcan himself, John Redwood, will not get to the conference rostrum, of course, because he did have the nerve to challenge Major last summer. Furthermore, though they plan a robust defence of their record, the rival claims of Stephen Dorrell at Health and Malcolm Rifkind at the Foreign Office - "wets pretending to have dried out" - are not taken seriously.

"Despite Herculean efforts, he has not been seen to deliver," is the verdict of one MP.Peter Lilley wins marks for his handling of the DSS, but "doesn't catch the imagination". But they do not have votes, and though the parliamentary party - which has - will be more right-wing after the election, his ambitions do not score where it matters. He is one of the few Cabinet ministers who can make ordinary people laugh.Like Portillo, the Home Secretary Michael Howard has been stumping the constituencies for months, winning standing ovations from audiences sometimes amounting to hundreds. "I hope's he's learned something," mutters a confirmed Europhobe "But actually I think he's sunk. Partly because of his performance at Blackpool last year, and partly because he wasn't prepared to stand up and be counted [in the leadership election against John Major] - when Redwood was."Ian Lang, the President of the Board of Trade, is singled out as a good "dark horse" bet in the leadership stakes, should he retain his marginal Galloway seat. A middle-ranking figure on the right conceded: "Ken is what we need in terms of style: a thug, basically, with bluster and barnstorming skills.

But we can't go in the political direction he would take us." The emphasis is not on policies The talk is of who, not what. Defence Secretary Michael Portillo will seek to restore his image, dented severely by his jingoistic performance last year. None rate Deputy Prime Minister Michael Heseltine's chances any more ("the lion is getting mangy" is a typical view) and few are willing to punt on Kenneth Clarke. His politics seem to trundle down the middle, yet he is acceptable to the right, too."Younger MPs concur, but speak of him as a leader-after-next, rather than a successor.