Norman Tebbit

David Cameron and Barack Obama arrive at the G8

David Cameron is facing a make-or-break time for his prime ministership. He has to carry his Cabinet including the semi-detached Lib Dems and his fading Europhile Conservative colleagues on his policy to stand back from any further financial entanglements to bail out the euro.

If the euro goes down, or when the euro goes down, it will not be for lack of bailing, nor the calibre of the Brussels bazooka, but because it was fatally holed below the waterline from its very inception. Nor is that a matter of being wise after the event. Many of us said so at the time. I expressed my conviction that the single currency would indeed be created and last at least ten years, but not more than twenty. We Maastricht rebels were derided… Read More

Beryl Goldsmith worked as Lord Tebbit's secretary and assistant for more than 25 years

Parliament, not to mention the Letters Page of the Daily Telegraph, is the poorer this week with the loss of Beryl Goldsmith OBE, for more than a quarter of a century my secretary and personal assistant, who died last Sunday. She was a very private person in life and even in death, which she met alone in her flat in the Barbican. She never married and, since the death of her brother, she had not one living blood relative. Her friends were her colleagues of the lower ground floor; the staff at the Members' Post Office; the porters at the Barbican, where she lived; and the minicab drivers who ferried… Read More

A protester in front of the Greek parliament

The Greek tragedy continues towards its inevitable end. Whether a coalition of parties in fundamental difference about what to do next is cobbled together this week, or whether another election brings about a government firmly committed to the repudiation of the deal by which Greece is being kept financially afloat at mainly German expense, it cannot be long before the eurozone loses its first member state.

Monetary union cannot last without fiscal union. Fiscal union cannot be achieved without political union. Political union is not acceptable to the peoples of Europe. If the cultures and economies are sufficiently alike, monetary union may be used to back nations into a political union, but Germany and Greece are simply not sufficiently alike. Indeed here in… Read More

A Prime Minister who seems to have lost his direction

Mid-term electoral blues for the party in office are nothing new. Most governments suffer them. Some recover in time for the following election. So on the surface what happened to the Government last Thursday was not only unsurprising, nor of itself does it rule out a recovery before 2015.

However, this attack of mid-term blues looks to be rather worse than normal. Nor is it just the inherent problems of being in coalition with a party whose very existence after the next election depends on the Conservative Party failing once again to win a majority.

The Prime Minister seem to have let the Labour Party get away from its record in government, and to pose as having found in opposition the solution to the problems which they created not long ago in government. That must… Read More

Tony Blair: a bleak legacy

Fifteen years ago, the carefully stage-managed crowds cheered as their hero arrived in Downing Street to take office on a wave of hopes for a better Britain. What was his legacy? What did Tony Blair achieve? Debt, war, ignorance, welfare dependency, social division.

The crushing burden of debt has held back our wealth creating industries, left us with higher taxes, lower pensions, higher prices, and fewer jobs

Blair's wars – the ill-conceived invasion of Iraq and the consequential war in Afghanistan – have left thousands of our servicemen dead or injured, tens of thousands civilians dead or injured, a prosperous secular Iraqi middle class destroyed, Islamic extremism gaining in strength, and our historical friendly relationship with Pakistan soured.

Blairite education policies have brought about an upsurge in illiteracy and innumeracy,… Read More

Hunt seems to have lost control (Photo: AFP/Getty)

In the lack of any credible alternative economic strategy, the Labour Opposition must be grateful indeed for the diversion offered by the difficulties of the Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt. As I watch these events unfold, I think how lucky I was to have held responsibilities for competition in the media industries back in the 1980s rather than today.

In those days I had just two political advisers, Sir Jeffrey (now Lord) Sterling, the chairman of P&O the shipping business, who kept me in touch with the City and Michael Dobbs (now Lord Dobbs the novelist), who was my day-to-day link with Conservative Party. They had no offices in my Department, nor any civil service ranking. Few indeed of the businesses I dealt with were represented by public relations men. There were no emails nor tweets, twittering… Read More

Firm in his faith: John Sentamu (Photo: PA)

The public debate about the succession to the post of Archbishop of Canterbury brought to my mind an incident some years ago in the days of the NuLab government, when I derived some constructive amusement from my work on the Opposition back benches.

As I walked up the stairs from the Members’ entrance to the House, one of the more light-heated of the bishops fell into step with me, and we exchanged greetings before he cheerily asked me: “What mischief are you up to today, Lord Tebbit?”

“That,” I replied with a grin, “is not a very charitable nor Christian remark.” But in a stroke of inspiration, perhaps even divine inspiration, I continued: “As a matter of fact I am going to put down my private members' bill. It is to give legal force… Read More

Greg Barker knows a swivelling eye when he sees one

My heart sank when I saw in the Telegraph that Greg Barker had told Christopher Hope, the Telegraph's political correspondent, that the Conservatives "don't need to follow Ukip into 'swivel-eyed rhetoric'" to win the general election. Of course, as an energy minister Mr Barker has some personal experience of generating swivel-eyed rhetoric, and I certainly don't think that wind farms and carbon taxes will do much to help the Conservatives to win in 2015. Even aside from that, there are a good many Conservatives who will question Mr Barker's enthusiasm for what he calls Mr Cameron's "robust and clear position on Europe."

On the Today Programme of October 1st last year it was Mr Cameron's deputy, Nick… Read More

Theresa May: presiding over a schizophrenic department

There are moments when I am thoroughly glad that I am not the Home Secretary. It is not her fault that she presides over a schizophrenic department charged with both upholding the law and upholding the rights of criminals. Nor that she is responsible for defending our borders against those who most of us would rather not have here, while at the same time defending the "human rights" of those who sneak their way in to our country to work for our harm. And on top of that, to pay for their money-grubbing lawyers to help them resist being thrown out.

Poor Mrs May. Her perfectly sensible efforts to allow the prosecution of suspected terrorists without having to expose vital information about our security services were heavily attacked… Read More

It wasn't just ethnic votes that won Galloway the seat (Photo: PA)

It would be all too easy for the major parties to react to the result of the Bradford West by election by just pulling the bedcovers over their heads and telling themselves that it will all go away if we pretend that it had not happened. But it did, and there was something very ugly about it.

Mr Galloway fought his campaign on an unashamed pitch for votes from a minority religous group. There was a high turn-out for a by election in what should have been a safe Labour seat and a very high, perhaps suspiciously high, number of postal votes. No doubt it would be possible to construct some criticisms of such matters, but that is not at the centre… Read More