IT is impossible to argue that Conservative leader Michael Howard does not have a point.

He is right: everyone should abide by the same planning laws; everyone should pay the same taxes. That is fair.

Of course he is being "opportunistic", as Labour says. All politicians are opportunistic - if the opportunity arises for them to represent voters' concerns, of course they are going to jump upon it. Indeed, yesterday we reported on Tony Blair's opportunism - jumping on Jamie Oliver's bandwagon. The standard of school dinners would not have been an election issue without Mr Oliver's intervention, and having had it drawn to his attention, Mr Blair is right to jump upon it.

It is also worth noting that many of the topics Mr Howard is jumping on have an inherent right-wing appeal to them. These act, in the words of one commentator, as "dogwhistles" to the Tory faithful - particularly those who once flirted with the UK Independence Party - and draw them homewards. And it is working: there are the beginnings of a Conservative revival.

However, such opportunism might win headlines and invigorate supporters - but does it really answer the kernel of the question?

In addressing the standards of school dinners, Mr Blair has set up the School Food Trust. This makes it look as if he is acting, but is the formation of another quango really going to raise the standard of the 37p worth of food set before our children?

In addressing the problem of travellers, Mr Howard talks tough and demands trespass laws and imprisonment terms. This makes it sound as if he is acting, but is toughness alone going to stop the illegal traveller encampments?

The obvious truth is that if you move travellers on from illegal place A where they are causing a nuisance to their law-abiding neighbours, they will eventually alight in illegal place B and cause another nuisance to a new set of law-abiding neighbours. Darlington council might have evicted travellers from the Morton Palms building site last month, but either these people vanished into thin air or they became another council's problem.

So how do we identify additional sites for these people and how do we get them to co-operate? Opportunism doesn't provide any answers and so it cannot address Mr Howard's very fair starting point of making everyone abide by the same laws and pay the same taxes.