“More than four million students every year leave their home country to study: of those almost half a million come to the UK…We should aim to increase our share of this growing market. But if we implement the latest idea from the Home Office for new restrictions on overseas students, we would not only miss this golden opportunity — we would be acting in a mean-spirited and inward-looking way” – David Willetts MP, The Times (£)
>Today:
“Why can’t we have an inquiry led by, say, a Canadian judge or an Australian prosecutor? Only then will we will get somewhere near the truth, when we can be sure that the person asking the questions does not owe his career to preferment to those suspected and has no concern to save friends from embarrassment” – Ross Clark, The Times (£)
“According to Britons, the most extreme party of any note are the governing Conservatives. With a score of 6.9, they are seen to languish farther from the centre ground than a Labour party fronted by ‘Red’ Ed Miliband, the most avowedly leftist leader of the opposition for a generation… For any Conservative who favours power over doctrinal purity, and there are still some, this data should chill the blood” – Janan Ganesh, Financial Times
>Today:
>Yesterday:
“David Cameron has offered a ‘generous’ financial package to the leaders of Northern Ireland to encourage them to resolve the political and sectarian legacy of the violence that plagued the province for three decades until the 1990s… Theresa Villiers, the Northern Ireland secretary, said…the package was conditional on the parties reaching a broad agreement on the issues that divide them — welfare reform and the highly sensitive questions of flag-flying, parade routes and dealing with the legacy of the violence” – Financial Times
“Hundreds of thousands of pensioners are receiving care at home which is so brief that they have to choose between eating or being taken to the lavatory. Three quarters of councils in England are offering pensioners just 15-minute visits from carers, a Freedom of Information survey has disclosed… Jeremy Hunt, the Health Secretary, described the figures as ‘unacceptable’, saying there were ‘too many examples of councils buying rushed care visits’” – Daily Telegraph
>Today:
“Motorists and cyclists are set to benefit from the government’s record £6 billion spending spree to fix potholes across England over the next six years. The £1 billion-a-year investment will be enough to fill in 18 million potholes… Patrick McLoughlin, the transport secretary, said potholes were a menace and that long-term planning would put an end to short-term fixes” – The Times (£)
“Labour is secretly targeting Nick Clegg’s seat in a ‘decapitation’ strategy to scupper future coalition negotiations between the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats. The deputy prime minister is already spending at least two days a week in his Sheffield Hallam constituency to counter the well-organised effort to overturn his majority, aides admit. When election campaigning begins in earnest, he is expected to have to spend at least a third of his time defending the seat” – The Times (£)