Politics

The Tory party may not like it, but David Cameron is now finally following a sensible EU policy. As today’s summit in Brussels starts, the Prime Minister appears to have decided what really matters to the UK, and realised that he needs to play nice with the Germans and French. At the top of the PM’s priority list — a priority voiced by Michael Howard on the Today Programme earlier — is avoiding the collapse of the euro. The consequences of a collapse on Britain’s economy are incalculable, but everyone knows they would be profound. Second comes the protection of the City. A Euroland tax on financial transactions would damage

James Forsyth’s interview with Owen Paterson is on virtually every front page this morning, and deservedly. Boris, bless him, can make calculated explosions at times when it suits him. But Paterson is not one for pyrotechnics or mischief. His thoughtful interview with James shows how believes that the eurozone is about to become ‘another country’ — he used the phrase several times — and one that can dictate regulations on the rest of Europe due to Qualified Majority Voting. James is posting a longer version of this interview later today, and I’d urge CoffeeHousers to read it. His Euroscepticism is rooted in his business background and the urgency he feels

Today was one of those days when we saw just how divisive the European issue can be to the Conservative party. The sight of Malcolm Rifkind and Nadine Dorries treating each other with barely disguised contempt on Newsnight was a sign of just how poisonous relations in the parliamentary party could become. Intriguingly, the Daily Mail reports in its first edition that ‘Even some of Mr Cameron’s closest Cabinet allies are understood to be shifting to a much more Eurosceptic position, with a five-strong group of ministers planning to visit the Prime Minister as early as today to urge him to toughen his stance.’ Cameron now finds himself trapped between

It is becoming increasingly clear what the Conservative party expects of its Prime Minister. If he is going to agree to 17 eurozone countries pushing ahead with the Franco-German plan for fiscal union, he needs to secure a new deal for Britain in exchange.   Just what this new deal should look like is a matter of intense debate in Conservative circles. If France and Germany turn the eurozone into a ‘fiscal union’, what does that mean for Britain’s standing in the European Union? At the weekend, Iain Duncan Smith suggested that the nature of the EU would change so much that a referendum would be necessary. No. 10 quickly

Much ado about a Cabinet split over Europe this morning. The Financial Times has interviewed Ken Clarke, whose europhile instincts are well known — something he shares with the senior Lib Dems. Clarke tells his eurosceptic colleagues not to expect powers to be repatriated from the EU at Friday’s summit. Meanwhile, David Cameron has written a piece in today’s Times (£), reiterating that he will veto any treaty that damages British interests. He also says that his ‘requests will be practical and focussed’. And therein, apparently, lays the split. The word ‘requests’ might open the possibility of repatriation. Cameron appears to be hedging his bets ahead of Friday’s summit, lowering his more

Labour has today unveiled a panel of experts to consider the future of British policing.  The review, chaired by the former Metropolitan Police Commissioner Lord Stevens, will report by spring 2013. There are far-reaching changes underway to the institutional structure of the police.  The coalition government is pursuing sweeping reforms of police pay and conditions and creating a remodelled national policing architecture, with a new National Crime Agency.  The boldest reform — devolving governance to locally elected Police & Crime Commissioners (PCCs) — will have long-term implications.  In this context, and in light of budget reductions of 14 per cent over four years, any study of the fundamentals of the

“I certainly think it’s a serious problem and I described it when we last discussed this as a canker on the body politic and I would stay with that,” said Jesse Norman on the World at One earlier today. The Bureau of Investigative Journalism’s sting, splashed by this morning’s Independent, of executives from lobbying/PR firm Bell Pottinger boasting of their influence over the prime minister has renewed the debate about regulating the lobbying industry, with calls for a public register to be established. Downing Street has outright denied the allegations, which do sound rather far-fetched. Bravado is, of course, the currency of thin-air merchants. The objection is not to the

David Cameron’s European problems seem to be mounting. The usual suspects — Carswell, Redwood, Jenkin et al — have been only too happy to take the airwaves and talk of this ‘great opportunity’ to repatriate powers. Those sentiments are growing across the backbenches. The Guardian quotes an ally of Iain Duncan Smith saying that he and his friends ‘do not accept the prime minister’s argument that the changes will only affect the eurozone. Of course the changes will have an impact on Britain.’ The mounting disquiet appears to have been created, to an extent, by the PM hedging his bets and lowering expectations. Originally, the plan was to repatriate power; but the present

Islamists have won a landslide in Egypt, with the Muslim Brotherhood and the ultra-Conservative Al Nour party winning some 60 per cent of the votes cast. Future rounds of elections may benefit them further, as they take pace in more rural and conservative areas. Their success should be a surprise to nobody. Egypt is a conservative Muslim society. Islamists have been far better organised than the ragtag revolutionaries that ousted Hosni Mubarak, having run million-person charities for decades. They also benefit from being seen as un-corrupt and having been opposed to Mubarak for years. Further, they have been able to run on a simple slogan ‘Islam is the Solution’ without

Earlier this morning, Number 10 briefed that fiscal union in the eurozone would not trigger a referendum in this country because sovereignty will not be transfered from London to Brussels — a pre-requisite for any vote. The problem for Cameron is that some of his backbenchers say there should be a referendum. Bernard Jenkin was on the Daily Politics earlier, insisting that fiscal integration marks a new era in the history of the Eurozone, which he dubbed ‘Maastricht Plus’. On the other hand, some eurosceptic backbenchers caution that now is not the time to hold a referendum — stability in the eurozone is the order of the day. As I wrote yesterday, this cautious

The Commons will debate the UK’s controversial extradition treaty with the US and the European Arrest Warrant later today. The debate has been brought by Dominic Raab MP. He was on the Today programme this morning, explaining that he wanted to introduce a ‘forum clause’ to the UK-US treaty. Forum is a principle that could apply in cross-border cases like Gary McKinnon’s, which Raab has been championing. Raab wants to end the ‘sort of haggling between prosecutors behind closed doors’ that governs extraditions at present, and reform the process by placing it before open court in Britain. He argues that numerous other countries enjoy such an arrangement with the US,