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The honeymoon is still on. As the Tory government sails serenely out of harbour, full steam ahead for the nearest rocks, the official cheerleaders of Fleet Street are still waving from the quayside and wishing her good luck.

But the caution that has been evident from the day after the election is coming more clearly to the fore.

Last week the Economist warned Thatcher to go easy on 'trade union reform' for a year and to consult with This came hard on the heels of earlier warnings from the Sunday Telegraph that consultation with the TUC would be reasonable.

It is characteristically dishonest therefore of the press to hail the Queen's Speech and Thatcher's subsequent speech in Parliament as being confident affirmation of the Tory election manifesto.

The truth is that the Tory government finds war cries preferable to action and shows considerable hesitation in launching its frontal attack on the working class.

According to the Daily Telegraph, Mrs. Thatcher, meeting Callaghan in the corridors of Westminster, remarked "You have left us a lot of problems"

And every single lobby correspondent on the national newspapers wrote unattributed stories during the week declaring that the Tory government had been "shocked" and "horrified" at the state of "the books" on taking office.

Some papers reported that tax cuts were now unlikely; others that the tax cuts would be introduced but that VAT would rise dramatically as a result.

The Economist expected at least 2% to be added to the cost of living figures through this increase in VAT alone.

Already therefore the press is preparing the ground for the real Tory budget and for the inevitable angry outcry from workers that will follow.

Nor is the Tory strategy of heading for massive job cuts to cut the public sector borrowing requirement likely to be any easy answer, as the swing to the left in the CPSA has made clear.

The Daily Telegraph, which has its own ideas on how trade union conferences should be run, complained:

"During the conference an excessive amount of time has been spent by Left-Wing militants in attacking Mr. Thomas, his executive and paid union officials"

The Telegraph knows that Thomas and his paid officials will be easy to deal with in the coming attacks on civil servants, jobs, but that the anger and militancy of the rank and file, stoked up by the sabotage of the fight on pay, will make the members .an entirely different proposition.

The press may have got the best government it could hope for. But that still does not mean it has a government capable of carrying through 105 demands.