Ruth Lea

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EuropaUnión Europea,

The best thing to be hoped for is that the Liberals Democrats will behave loyally and modestly in the national interest; loyally when the going gets tough over reducing the deficit, and modestly with regard to the lack of enthusiasm for PR to which their bad showing in the election attests.

Sadly that is Cloudcuckoo Land, because the modern Liberal party is often to the left of Labour and sees this as a once-in-a-generation chance to muscle in PR. Every Government since the war has always been re-elected once — except Ted Heath’s in 1974 — so a minority Tory ministry is the second best thing to hope for.…  Seguir leyendo »

EuropaUnión EuropeaEconomía

As the Greek Government has to raise more than €50 billion of public debt this year from markets that already question its ability to honour its debts, the 64,000-dollar question remains: how willing are Greece’s EU partners to bail it out?

There is the widespread view that Greece will be supported if default looks likely. After all, Joaquín Almunia, the former Monetary Affairs Commissioner, said as much at Davos. But the outlook became muddied at last week’s meeting of the Council of the European Union. There was clearly friction between Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, mindful of taxpayers’ resistance to bailing out Greece in the name of EU solidarity, and President Sarkozy of France, who not only supported a bailout but, taking the opportunity afforded by crisis to further political union, also pushed for a centralised “economic government”.…  Seguir leyendo »