Politics: The right way to help Ireland

Why is Britain committing £7 billion to a bailout which will trap Ireland in its present discontents?

Would you trust an economic forecaster who had recently said this?

The euro has done more to enforce budgetary discipline in the rest of Europe than any number of exhortations from the IMF or the OECD. If we remain outside the euro, we will simply continue to subside into a position of relative poverty and inefficiency compared to our more prosperous European neighbours.


Or this:

The euro has already provided great internal stability to the eurozone.

Or this:

If we get rid of sterling and adopt the euro, we will also get rid of sterling crises and sterling overvaluations. This will give us a real control over our economic environment.

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Ed West

Trump is going to give us a thousand years of woke

Alarmingly, the author of the first two quotations is Nick Clegg, the Deputy Prime Minister. The author of the third is Chris Huhne, the Environment Secretary. Not that I want to pick on Lib Dems. Michael Heseltine thought it was ‘barking mad’ not to join the single currency at the beginning. Peter Mandelson averred that ‘the price we will pay in lost investment and jobs would be incalculable’. Ken Clarke agreed, saying ‘Britain’s economy would be damaged if we stayed out too long.’

Almost precisely 20 years ago — 22 November 1990 — Margaret Thatcher was forced from office, largely because she understood that scrapping the pound would be disastrous. As one of my Conservative Association chairmen put it yesterday, ‘Margaret has had the last word over the November Criminals.’

Of course, those who got it wrong will still be wheeled out by the BBC as disinterested experts, while those who got it right will still be presented as doctrinaire hardliners. And — I’m afraid there is no way of putting this without swanking — we did get it right, we Eurosceptics.