Politics

As David Cameron continued his charm offensive in Europe today on a visit to the Czech Republic, are there signs he is feeling the heat over his EU renegotiation? In his press conference, the PM remained almost relentlessly positive as he spoke about ‘solutions’ and ‘working together’ with other European leaders. But he also appeared to offer a brief flash of insight into the pressure he is under to get a good deal for Britain over EU renegotiation – saying that doing so was ‘hard work’. He said: ‘It’s hard work because what we are looking for is real and substantive change. But I firmly believe there is a pathway

It now looks as though a decision on expanding Heathrow (or Gatwick), which had been pencilled in for this summer, could be slipping back again. Patrick McLoughlin, the Transport Secretary, certainly seemed to be bracing us for more waiting when quizzed over airport expansion on LBC yesterday. The current deadline is the summer. But McLoughlin said the busy political timetable could get in the way of that – and spoke about summer as aspiration rather than a firm deadline. ‘I hope later this year, we have said we hope to move some way by the summer. There are lots of other things that are going on in the political spectrum – if

Michael Caine started his Today programme interview apparently unsure about whether he was going to vote in or out in the EU referendum. But just a few seconds later, the Hollywood star seemed to change his mind live on air – saying we were better off without Europe, which is packed with ‘thousands of faceless civil servants’. He said: ‘I don’t know what to vote for, both are scary. To me, you’ve now got, in Europe, a government by proxy of everybody who has now got carried away, and I think unless there is some extremely significant changes we should get out. Because you say, we’ll fail, so you fail

‘So what’s your alternative?’ demand Euro-enthusiasts. ‘D’you want Britain to be like Norway? Or like Switzerland? Making cuckoo clocks? Is that what you want? Is it? Eh?’ The alternative to remaining in a structurally unsafe building is, of course, walking out; but I accept that this won’t quite do as an answer. Although staying in the EU is a greater risk than leaving — the migration and euro crises are deepening, and Britain is being dragged into them — change-aversion is deep in our genome, and we vote accordingly. Europhiles know that most referendums go the way of the status quo, which is why their campaign is based around conjuring

Corbynterpretation [n]: The inevitable process of debate, after Jeremy Corbyn is interviewed, over what he actually meant. Does the Labour leader believe the killing of Osama bin Laden was a tragedy, or not believe this? Would he like Britain to negotiate with Daesh or would he be opposed to that happening? Would he, or would he not, abandon the Falkland Islands? As in, ‘Well, that’s a matter of Corbynterpretation’ or, ‘No, no, those remarks have been totally misCorbynterpreted.’ In order to Corbynterpret [v] one must first consider 1. Whether the Labour leader brought up the disputed view himself (invariably not) 2. Whether the Labour leader clearly said ‘yes’ after somebody

‘Who’s to blame for financial crisis’ is a poem I wrote in 2012, rhyming ‘speculators, spivs and traders’ with ‘rich, -uncaring hedge-fund raiders’, while taking passing swipes at Gordon Brown and ‘Mervyn King, who really didn’t do a thing’. But it’s too early in 2016 to update my ditty, because the new crisis — if that’s what it is — hasn’t really hit us yet, except in share prices that clearly have further to fall. And the question of who’s to blame, never mind how to make them rhyme, is going to be a lot more difficult this time round. ‘It’s China’s fault,’ was the gist of bulletins about the