Daniel Korski has written a short piece at Spectator Coffee House entitled Where has the pro-EU camp gone? It’s a valid question to ask, if you view UK politics along the traditional lines of pro-EU versus anti-EU. The problem is that very frame only gets you so far. Korski rightly...
I’m just back from the Presidency Press Trip in Copenhagen. It has resulted in numerous blog entries from me (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6), a set on Flickr, and masses of activity on Twitter. The FT blog has a post about the trip, and Nicolas has a couple of...
It seemed like an excellent opportunity – to write a weekly column for LabourList, one of the biggest left-leaning blogs in the UK. Take EU matters to a new, wider audience. So I thought. In the second half of 2011 I churned out more than 20 columns, and a variety...
Today has been a normal sort of day for me online, in that I’ve stumbled across a couple of really fascinating things, stuff that’s brilliant. Today it was the Lytro camera, and an examination of the design work of Dieter Rams. Earlier this week it has been Solar-Powered 3D Printer that...
Political leaders in the EU are incapable of leading us out of the current multiple crises we face. I think that’s generally understood. But what we’ve been incapable of explaining is why is leadership in such a bad way? Where is our Adenauer, Kohl or Delors when we need them?
It sounded a bit far-fetched – that the UK wants to set higher standards for its banks than the EU would allow. But these are Cameron’s words in his statement on Monday [from Hansard here]: To those who say that we were trying to go soft on the banks, nothing...
Take a deep breath. Step aside from your preconceptions about the UK and the EU, and your views on David Cameron, Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sakozy. I’m trying to do that when writing this blog entry. Follow the steps of the simplified conversation below, and please comment if I am...
There’s too much still to digest in the fall-out from yesterday’s summit for me to write a full blog entry on it all, but there is one technical point on which David Cameron is wrong. As if he didn’t already look petulant enough, Cameron stated that he would make sure...
Anyone would think – from reading the stories today on The Guardian’s website – that the UK is shaping up for some major fight with the European Union over treaty reform prior to this week’s summit. There are two problems with this. First, the agreement might not be for treaty...
I suppose if you run Liberal Conspiracy you’re grateful for pieces from MPs and have to accept them. Today – via this tweet from Sunny Hundal – I read “We need to re-assess our approach to Europe” by Helen Goodman MP. This follows on from Douglas Alexander’s effort to re-assess...
Ken Livingstone’s first term as Mayor of London is intrinsically associated with the Congestion Charge. An unpopular idea at the start it is now impossible to imagine London without it. The quid pro quo for it was the investment in London’s buses, now almost without exception modern and disabled-accessible. The...
“It’s in Britain’s national interest to be in the EU” – it pains me how often we hear that phrase (or words that that effect) in speeches made by UK politicians about the EU. Yet we very seldom question its use. The need to start to question it, for me...