CONFERENCE speeches are not always the best places to go hunting for political substance.

Too often they are airbrushed, safety-first affairs designed to tickle a home crowd while avoiding anything that might look dangerously interesting.

Not so Nicola Sturgeon's first address as SNP leader. It contained a clear political creed, announced her "personal mission" to tackle poverty and inequality, and put the SNP on an election footing with a bewildered Labour Party its clear target.

With no immediate prospect of another referendum, it also gave the party's 60,000 new members something to get their teeth into and goals to achieve.

Sturgeon had already flagged up a change in the SNP's focus last week, telling the Sunday Herald the party would look beyond the constitution towards a social justice agenda.

What was missing was detail.

She has now started to fill in some of the blanks.

The steps are not a radical departure for the SNP, but by extending its existing commitments they should help cement a reputation for building a fairer Scottish society.

The government recently increased free childcare to 600 hours a year.

Extending it to more than 1100 within a parliament would continue this trend in dramatic, but consistent, fashion. Likewise the promise to carry on increasing NHS spending in real terms each year.

These pledges are welcome. However, with Westminster addicted to austerity, balancing the books will be critical. Sturgeon herself said in January that transforming childcare was not possible under devolution, and that independence was needed, otherwise the costs would mean cutting other services. How she squares that circle will be a key test of her administration.

Some say Sturgeon's tone implies a lurch to the left. But as a party containing as diverse a range of views as the SNP, and which counts the rural northeast as a heartland, it is unlikely to do that.

Although Sturgeon is clearly in hot pursuit of Labour votes, she has not said the SNP is about to vacate the centre or soft-right of Scottish politics. Rather than move the party wholesale in one direction, it is more likely she will try to extend its appeal while holding on to the support the SNP already enjoys.

Her emphasis on being a business-friendly First Minister and the importance of a healthy economy was a pointer to that.

The goal, after all, is to transcend party politics and become a national movement capable of delivering independence. It eluded Alex Salmond, but as Sturgeon put it yesterday, "the summit is in sight".