As David Cameron recovers from the biggest-ever Tory rebellion over Europe, he should beware of another dramatic, self-inflicted injury.
The government has stopped short of giving its official endorsement to Rebecca Harris’s bill to move Britain on to Central European Time. But nor has it quashed the idea, which it could have done. Instead, government whips have allowed the bill to move to its next stage — the so-called money resolution. When this happens, the proposal will be significantly closer to becoming law.
Should the bill pass — with the Prime Minister’s blessing, or even under his instructions — it would exacerbate three of his biggest problems: the Scotland question, the Tory party’s difficulties in the north, and tensions over the influence of Nick Clegg.
On one level, it seems an irrelevance. With the eurozone ablaze and British unemployment rising, the issue of what time British clocks are set to seems trivial.
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