Michael Howard must use this year's party conference to get his message across to the country, senior Tories have signalled.

The Tory faithful will gather in Bournemouth in early October for a conference the party is describing as "the most important we have held for many years".

Ahead of the crunch conference backbench MPs have emphasised the need to use the occasion to reach out to "as wide a range of people as possible".

Whilst MPs believe Howard has performed well since taking the leadership last year, they say he now needs up his national profile by presenting a credible case for a Conservative government.

This year's conference is expected to be the last set piece event before the next general election, which could come in the spring of 2005.

With reports that Labour may call the Hartlepool by-election during the conference, Conservative officials are already reported to have made contingency plans.

The party leader's keynote speech is set to be moved from the Thursday to the Tuesday in a bid to prevent it being overshadowed by the poll, which was caused by Peter Mandelson's appointment as a European commissioner.

In 2003 the conference was the scene of mounting discontent at Iain Duncan Smith's leadership.

But now officials hope that Howard's leadership will provide a "radical change" in party fortunes.

Senior Conservative MP John Redwood told ePolitix.com that the party "needs to show that it has the ideas and the policies that we need to govern the country".

He said the party was in "a very workman-like mood".

"It knows there is a lot to do and it wants to get on with the job," the Wokingham MP added.

"I think people are now heartily sick of Labour, they have made up their minds that they don't like what this government is doing - all tax and no delivery - but they haven't yet settled in enough numbers on the Conservatives."

He added that the aim of the conference "must be to show them that we are ready for government and that we have ideas they would like".

And another former minister, John Maples, said the party should build on the "solid foundations" developed under Howard.

"In the last six months or so we have produced some really interesting policy ideas which address people's concerns over public services, law and order and asylum issues," he told this website.

"We had some considerable success in the local elections, we did well in the European elections and it is important that we use the party conference platform to communicate these ideas to as wide a range of people as possible."

Rejecting suggestions that the party should think in terms of "left" and "right", Redwood also said he was looking for "good policies that solve problems people have with taxation and public services".

"What we now have to do is get those ideas over to as many people as we possibly can so that they understand what they would mean for them," he said.

That view was backed by Maples, who told ePolitix.com that the party should explain its plans "to as many people as we possibly can so that they understand what they would mean for them".