By David Seymour The CBI has tended to take a fairly neutral line to Britain’s relationship with Europe, not wanting to upset the small number of its members who are sceptical about the EU. That changed yesterday. And how. In his presidential address to the Confederation’s conference in London, Sir Roger Carr spoke out boldly [...]

By Chiara Masini The Italian economy is in recession for the fifth quarter in a row so is the medicine ordered by Brussels/Frankfurt/Berlin and executed by Mario Monti working? According to the Italian national statistics institute (Istat), GDP shrank by 0.2% in the third quarter and is down 2.4% year-on-year. But the third quarter decline [...]

By David Gow Ed Miliband’s comments yesterday – in an interview with the Sunday Telegraph ahead of today’s speech at the CBI conference – have widely and cynically been interpreted as his response to the growing support for Ukip. Or, at the very least, as another stage in his campaign to drive David Cameron’s Tories [...]

By Peter Wilding With Boris helpfully goading baying backbenchers, the PM travels to his hopeless Brussels rendezvous this week with no option but to do his worst. However, chances of a compromise deal have increased in recent days from about 10 per cent to nearer 30 per cent, says Downing Street, suggesting the most likely [...]

By Paul Meller Protests against painful austerity measures and rising unemployment brought hundreds of thousands of workers out onto the streets in cities around Europe on Wednesday. They came as Olli Rehn, the EU’s top economic official, disclosed that Spain need not impose extra austerity measures over the next 13 months to reach exacting deficit [...]

By David Seymour Come the referendum, four million women are more likely to vote against continued membership of the EU. At least they are if they believe the latest scare story in the Daily Express. It claims female motorists will be “driven off the roads” when gender-neutral insurance premiums are introduced next month. After many years [...]

By Quentin Peel Angela Merkel wants to keep David Cameron on board in European Union negotiations, above all to ensure that he does not try to block efforts to find a lasting solution to the eurozone crisis. That is her absolute priority. Although the two are miles apart in their vision of the EU’s future, [...]

By Shreyaa Chezhian The catfight in Europe over laws to require quotas for women on boards steps up a gear this week. Vivian Reding, the EU Commissioner for justice, fundamental rights and citizenship, is still pushing a one-size-fits-all quota of 40% for boards across Europe in the latest version of her proposed legislation, a parliamentary [...]

By David Gow The EU is hardly endearing itself to its 500m citizens with hypocritical brinkmanship and priggish posturing over the budget for 2012 and 2013. And there certainly will be no winners if today’s “conciliation” talks fail to reach a deal by the midnight deadline – and, instead, collapse as they did on Friday [...]

By Peter Wilding With the collapse of the budget talks last week*, Sir Jon Cunliffe, Britain’s ambassador to the EU, is spared the task of assembling a last minute pro-Cameron ‘freeze alliance’. Nucleus understands he was not hopeful. But, politicians and media must not believe that alliance building is always a futile exercise for the [...]