David Cameron is out doing the media rounds today. He wants to, in his words, get back to the ‘big picture’, the argument over deficit reduction. Indeed, Danny Alexander’s speech today saying that departments have to indentify additional saving seems to have been timed to tee up this argument.
Cameron’s Today Programme interview, though, was dominated by Abu Qatada, tax avoidance, Lords reforms and whether or not — in John Humphrys’ words — the PM is ‘a bit lazy.’ On Qatada, Cameron was insistent that the Home Office had ‘checked repeatedly’ with the European Court of Human Rights on the deadline. I expect that the Home Office will have to release details of these contacts today.
Humphrys, who was in particularly loquacious form this morning, then pressed Cameron on whether he thought Sir Philip Green, who has advised the coalition on procurement, was an aggressive tax avoider and thus, by George Osborne’s definition, morally repugnant.
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