Mr Cameron also mounted a strong attack on Labour's approach to the relationships between people, arguing that Labour believes there is "no such thing as society".
In a twist on a claim often associated with Margaret Thatcher, Mr Cameron said that excessive state intervention in people's lives had broken down relationships between people.
He said: "For Labour there is only the state and the individual, nothing in between. No family to rely on, no friend to depend on, no community to call on. No neighbourhood to grow in, no faith to share in, no charities to work in. No-one but the Minister, nowhere but Whitehall, no such thing as society - just them, and their laws, and their rules, and their arrogance. You cannot run our country like this."
Mr Cameron has faced criticism for talking of a "broken society", but he said he stood by the phrase.
"Some say our society isn't broken. I wonder what world they live in," he said, citing almost 2 million children in households where no one works, housing estates in Britain where people have a lower life expectancy than in the Gaza Strip and the "senseless, barbaric violence on our streets".
He added: "In one generation we seem to have abandoned the habits of all human history that in a civilised society, adults have a proper role - a responsibility - to uphold rules and order in the public realm not just for their own children but for other people's too."
