Last year Dr Fox’s friends were accused of publicising his fears that defence cuts would leave us dangerously exposed. This time it’s his enemies who are suspected of leaking his reservations about the overseas aid programme.
But whoever it was, won’t millions applaud him when he says it’s foolish to pass an inflexible law, committing us to give more to foreign countries?
Indeed, the Mail would go further than Dr Fox, who says he has no quarrel with the principle of boosting aid to 0.7 per cent of our national income.
As we’ve constantly argued, it is simply wrong to protect (let alone increase) the overseas aid budget — much of which ends up in the Swiss bank accounts of Third World dictators — while we’re making huge sacrifices at home. After all, it’s our money they’re giving away.
Yet, time and again, this Government puts foreign demands first — as we saw on Monday, when Chancellor George Osborne signed up to a rescue fund for Portugal, bringing our contributions to bailing out the euro to £500 per family.
How can such handouts be justified when essential services are being cut and Dr Fox is being asked to make yet more cuts in our defences?
Mr Cameron is said to regard lavish overseas aid as essential to ‘detoxifying’ the image of his party. But what could be more toxic than giving more to regimes that harbour terrorists while weakening our ability to defend ourselves?
But yesterday, when he unveiled the most radical green agenda in Europe, the eco-fanatical Energy Secretary gave us a third, even more powerful one.
For make no mistake: Mr Huhne’s plans to halve the country’s carbon emissions by 2025 could have a devastating impact on Britain’s ability to compete.
There might be some point to his proposals if only they stood a chance of creating a cleaner, greener planet.
But with the UK producing less than two per cent of the world’s carbon emissions and China opening two coal-fired power stations a week, they won’t make the slightest difference.
Like the plans for new rights to paternity leave and flexible working, all they will do is pile on the costs and paperwork for British businesses, while adding yet more to our soaring domestic energy bills.
Fortunately, Mr Huhne has been made to promise a review of his targets in 2014. The Mail hopes that by then, we’ll have a new Energy Secretary who will scrap them.
This paper acknowledges that the House of Lords has become an ignoble shambles, stuffed with nearly 800 washed-up expenses fiddlers, Blair cronies and Cameron placemen.But in the depths of Britain’s appalling economic crisis, is this really the moment for Nick Clegg to embark on a huge parliamentary battle to reform it?
You might think he would have learned something from the public’s deafening No to his last effort at constitutional meddling. Or does he see Lords reform as a consolation prize for his resounding defeat in the AV referendum?
We suspect that, once again, he has bitten off more than he can chew.
Source http://www.dailymail.co.uk/
But whoever it was, won’t millions applaud him when he says it’s foolish to pass an inflexible law, committing us to give more to foreign countries?
Indeed, the Mail would go further than Dr Fox, who says he has no quarrel with the principle of boosting aid to 0.7 per cent of our national income.
As we’ve constantly argued, it is simply wrong to protect (let alone increase) the overseas aid budget — much of which ends up in the Swiss bank accounts of Third World dictators — while we’re making huge sacrifices at home. After all, it’s our money they’re giving away.
Yet, time and again, this Government puts foreign demands first — as we saw on Monday, when Chancellor George Osborne signed up to a rescue fund for Portugal, bringing our contributions to bailing out the euro to £500 per family.
How can such handouts be justified when essential services are being cut and Dr Fox is being asked to make yet more cuts in our defences?
Mr Cameron is said to regard lavish overseas aid as essential to ‘detoxifying’ the image of his party. But what could be more toxic than giving more to regimes that harbour terrorists while weakening our ability to defend ourselves?
A waste of energy
The turmoil in his personal life may be one good reason for removing Chris Huhne from the Cabinet. The suspicion that he lied and perverted the course of justice over a driving offence is another.But yesterday, when he unveiled the most radical green agenda in Europe, the eco-fanatical Energy Secretary gave us a third, even more powerful one.
For make no mistake: Mr Huhne’s plans to halve the country’s carbon emissions by 2025 could have a devastating impact on Britain’s ability to compete.
There might be some point to his proposals if only they stood a chance of creating a cleaner, greener planet.
But with the UK producing less than two per cent of the world’s carbon emissions and China opening two coal-fired power stations a week, they won’t make the slightest difference.
Like the plans for new rights to paternity leave and flexible working, all they will do is pile on the costs and paperwork for British businesses, while adding yet more to our soaring domestic energy bills.
Fortunately, Mr Huhne has been made to promise a review of his targets in 2014. The Mail hopes that by then, we’ll have a new Energy Secretary who will scrap them.
Clegg’s booby prize?
This paper acknowledges that the House of Lords has become an ignoble shambles, stuffed with nearly 800 washed-up expenses fiddlers, Blair cronies and Cameron placemen.You might think he would have learned something from the public’s deafening No to his last effort at constitutional meddling. Or does he see Lords reform as a consolation prize for his resounding defeat in the AV referendum?
We suspect that, once again, he has bitten off more than he can chew.
Source http://www.dailymail.co.uk/
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