Mr. Biggs-Davison asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department the estimated number of tubercular and other hard core refugees to be admitted to the United Kingdom during the World Refugee Year; and the arrangements for their reception and settlement.

Mr. R. A. Butler Two hundred refugees, including eighteen suffering from tuberculosis, as well as others with a past history of this disease, have so far been accepted for admission during World Refugee Year. Details of the arrangements for their reception and settlement were given in my reply to a Question by my hon. Friend the Member of Lewisham. North (Mr. Chataway) on 30th October, 1959.

Mr. D. Smith asked the Postmaster-General the number of people in Brent-ford and Chiswick on his Department's waiting list for telephones and the number who share telephone lines.
 
Mr. Bevins  One hundred and nine are on the waiting list, and 240 applications are under inquiry or in course of being met. The number of people sharing their telephone lines is 1,736. During the past twelve months, 818 telephones were installed in Brentford and Chiswick.

Mr. Prentice asked the Minister at Transport whether the ideas incorporated in the Cornell-Liberty safety car in the United States of America have been examined by his Department in the interests of road safety; and to what extent, and by what methods, he will encourage the application of those ideas in this country.
 
Mr. Marples  Details of this imaginative research project were carefully examined by my technical advisers. Some of its special design features are of a practical character and are already incorporated in car models now being produced; some appear to be unsuitable or not readily adaptable for use on normal types of cars.
Extensive studies and research into safe vehicle design have been undertaken in this and other countries, and discussions by international bodies, with a view to reducing the risk of serious injury in the event of accident, are continuing.

The story of the judge who said he wanted to allow Sikhs to walk around with kirpans has prompted some debate across blogs that I quickly want to weigh in on.

My position, as I've said previously when writing on knife crime, is that schools should have the right to make up their own policy. In some cases a kirpan may not be of consequence, in other cases a school may be worried that knife crime is out of control. There may even be cases where Sikhs are running around stabbing people – in which case a school may like to step in and put in a complete ban. I'm in favour of local decisions based on local conditions, simply because there is a danger of some Sikhs abusing the rules that govern usage of the dagger.

Jako from Frank Owen's Paintbrush says:

Insisting that Sikhs should have the right to walk around with their ceremonial daggers - even in schools - certainly suggests the man is possessed by a religious arrogance of such massive proportions that there isn't room for any other considerations.

Pity the BBC Asian Network didn't bother finding an opposing point of view. I'm sure there's a sensible Sikh out there willing to say that some of the more eccentric teachings of their faith should not be given privilege over the law of the land (and of course basic common sense).

The chances of finding a Sikh saying that the kirpan is "eccentric" are as low as the chances of a Sikh saying that the Gurus were idiots. Not. Going. To. Happen. I'm not particularly religious (I don't follow Sikhism but I do say I have a Sikh heritage) but I wouldn't go that far.

But there is a point about religion in the public space, and I think Dave Semple is spot on:

This principle is not at stake in this case. Quite the opposite. Thinking secularists would surely defend the right of anyone to do anything, provided that it was unlikely to result in harm or the coercion of any individual.

When Jako claims that 'the more eccentic teachings of their faith should not be given privilege over the law of the land" I am at a loss to explain such anti-religious nonsense, a parody, almost, of real secularism. Just because something is a law does not justify it.

If we take the incident of the Sikh girl and her kara from a few years back, where no health and safety issues were at stake, the courts quite rightly ruled that to exclude her for wearing something so connected to her beliefs was discriminatory. So the law is not so uncomplicated as Jako thinks anyway.

Dave's whole article is very worth reading. But I want to make a wider point here: there is a strain on the left that is militantly anti-religion, and not just pro-secularist. I've pointed out in the past that the National Secular Society also makes this mistake of conflating secularism with atheism and represents the latter view that a nuanced former view.

Politically, this means is that many lefties ends up pissing off people, especially Christians, who want to retain their religious identity in public. I don't think religious people should get special treatment or be absolved of discrimination – but this misunderstanding of secularism really is a political liability.

If the left becomes anti-religion then we'll never be able to build coalitions on many issues like fighting poverty, sustaining welfare programmes and get near any sort of power.

"a charismatic guy with a Teleprompter"

- how Sarah Palin described Barack Obama during her speech at the National Tea Party Convention in Nashville last weekend.  Unfortunately for Palin, though, it seems that Obama is not the only one who needs a little help remembering his lines as Palin was photographed with crib notes written on the palm of her hand during the very same speech.  A close examination of the former vice-presidential candidate revealed she had the words "Energy", "Tax," and "Lift Americans Spirits" scrawled in ink on the inside of her left hand.  "Budget cuts" was written and then crossed out.  She surreptitiously glanced at the words during a question and answer session afterwards when she was asked what should be the top three things a Republican majority in Congress would focus on.

Leader of the Commons announces that the government will set aside a day for debates and votes on the controversial changes

Harriet Harman today moved to allay MPs' fears they could be deprived of a vote on proposed Commons reforms designed to increase the influence of backbenchers.

The leader of the Commons announced that the government was setting aside a day, provisionally 4 March, for debates and votes on the controversial changes.

The move comes after the Tories accused Gordon Brown of delaying the reforms and the prime minister appeared to suggest last week there might not be time before the general election.

The reforms were put forward by the select committee on the reform of the House of Commons, chaired by Labour MP Tony Wright.

They include electing members and chairmen of select committees via a ballot of all MPs and setting up a backbench business committee to schedule non-government business.

But Harman said the backbench business committee needed further consideration to clarify its scope and procedures and that the government motion would back it "in principle".

She also indicated the government would not at this stage support the establishment of a house business committee to consider all Commons scheduling.

The reforms are to be debated in the Commons on 22 February, but there were concerns there was no time set aside for further debate or votes on the more controversial aspects.

The Tory leader, David Cameron, has called for the half-term recess later this week to be postponed by a day to create time for consideration of the Wright reforms.

Harman said today that the 22 February debate would provide an opportunity to make "immediate progress" on measures which commanded universal support in the Commons.

She went on: "For any motions which are opposed, we will make time for a further debate and, if necessary, votes.

"We are considering providing a day to do this no later than the week following the debate, provisionally at the sitting on Thursday 4 March."

Her announcement, in a written statement to the Commons, comes as Harman is due to appear before the Wright committee tomorrow morning.

Also due to give evidence are the shadow Commons leader, George Young, and the Liberal Democrat spokesman, David Heath.

Defence secretary says the Taliban will only negotiate if the military campaign by the international coalition and the Afghan army continues to make progress

The Taliban leadership has no desire to seek peace with the Afghan government of Hamid Karzai, the defence secretary, Bob Ainsworth, warned today.

Giving evidence to the Commons defence committee, he said the Taliban would only be brought to the negotiating table if the military campaign by the international coalition and the Afghan army continued to make progress.

Ainsworth defended the controversial "reintegration and reconciliation" programme launched by the President Karzai at last month's London conference on Afghanistan.

He said the aim was to "peel off" elements of the insurgency who were motivated by local grievances rather than the "international jihadist agenda" of al-Qaida.

He acknowledged that there was no immediate prospect of any reconciliation with the senior Taliban leadership.

"Reconciliation with the top end of the Taliban command is still some way away," he said.

"I don't think that there is a desire by the overwhelming majority of the leadership of the Taliban to reconcile. I think that may come, it will come in time, it will come if we are seen to make progress."

He said that if talks came, the Afghan government needed to be able to negotiate from a position of strength, which was why it was necessary to continue to build up the Afghan army and police.

"We do not expect them to negotiate with an enemy from a position of weakness. We expect them to peel off parts of the insurgency as part of the process of winning the confidence of the Afghan people," he said.

"We should try to split off those elements of the insurgency who are wedded to al-Qaida and the international jihadist agenda from those who have more local reasons for joining the insurgency."

He denied that the reintegration and reconciliation programme amounted to "blatant bribery" and said it was designed to work by offering alternative economic opportunities in the form of jobs and addressing local issues.

"We are not proposing in some kind of simplistic way to bribe people to put down their guns so that they can pick up their guns tomorrow. That would achieve absolutely nothing," he said.

Ainsworth said Operation Moshtarak, about to be launched in central Helmand province involving 30,000 international troops, had been announced in advance in part to help avoid civilian casualties.

He said it was important to give people a chance to flee the area before the fighting began if they were to succeed in winning the hearts and minds of the local population.

"The last thing we want to do is to go into an area and inflict unnecessary civilian casualties. One is too many," he said.

"Giving the civilian population the opportunity to move away from the fighting is an important part of the preparations."

Gordon Brown said Operation Moshtarak would mark an important step in the process of handing over control to local security forces.

With further British causalities expected, Brown paid tribute to the armed forces, "their professionalism, their dedication, their expertise, their service and their sacrifice".

"Marjah and a small number of other centres are the last remaining bases for Taliban-led insurgency in the main population areas of Helmand," he said as he launched the UK's Civilian Stabilisation Unit - which will work alongside the military after the offensive.

"The aim of Operation Moshtarak - which means in the Dari language 'together' - is that the Afghans and the coalition work together for peace, to drive out those lingering points of resistance from the Taliban, to dismantle the bomb-making factories where IEDs are assembled to attack our troops and then, by dealing with the insurgents, to make the Afghan population secure."

The PM said he had discussed the role of the offensive in the "Afghanisation" process with Karzai by telephone at the weekend.

"Over the next few weeks we will take new steps to make this strategy a reality, with Afghan forces clearing, holding and building in the main population centres of their own country.

"Our aim is always to minimise casualties and to separate a hardline Taliban from those who have been caught up in the insurgency.

"The people of Marjah have been alerted in advance, the insurgents given time to leave and the population have all been informed that we will make them more secure.

"And once we have worked together, Afghans and the coalition, to clear the areas, the Afghans will take the lead in holding these areas as Afghanistan takes more responsibility for its own security."

Asked if 2010 would be a less bloody year in Afghanistan for British forces than the previous 12 months, the David Miliband, the foreign secretary, told a Westminster lunch: "I think the answer to that significantly depends on how this forthcoming campaign goes."

He added: "2009 was a very, very bloody year and I think that a lot of lessons have been learned."

o Burnham denies planning £20,000 inheritance levy to fund social care
o Claims Labour cancer pledge would save 10,000 lives
o Launches anti-Tory internet campaign

8.58am: The Labour party is holding another campaign press conference this morning.

Douglas Alexander, the general election co-ordinator, and Andy Burnham, the health secretary, have invited journalists to their HQ at Victoria Street to hear them "outline Labour's campaign for the NHS and the threat posed by David Cameron and the Conservative party policy on the NHS".

I'm not sure how good it's going to be; Gordon Brown delivered a big speech on the NHS just yesterday. But if they don't have much new to say about the NHS, there are plenty of other topics to ask about. The press conference starts at 10am.

9.59am: I'm at Victoria Street now in the holding room, waiting for the press conference to begin. Coffee and biscuits are available.

Reading Gordon Brown's speech, I see that Labour's health policy has got more guarantees than a branch of Currys. There's a cancer guarantee, a waiting time guarantee, a GP access guarantee, a health check guarantee and a care guarantee.

10.07am: They've just handed out a news release. Burnham is launching a voteNHS.com website to support a key element of Labour's health manifesto. The release says:

The "target cancer" campaign aims to save up to 10,000 lives by backing a pledge to create a new NHS guarantee of cancer diagnosis within one week of GP referral, allowing patients to be tested and told their results in just seven days.

10.09am: Alexander and Burnham are here.

Burnham says he does not believe in over-claiming for the NHS. He's not complacent. There are many places where it could improve. But there have been real improvements over the last few years.

At the 2005 election Labour promised to bring down waiting times to a 18 week maximum and to half MRSA rates. People said it could not be done. But it was achieved, he says.

Today Labour is promising to ensure cancer patients get their results back within one week by 2015. Experts say this could save 10,000 lives.

Catching cancer early also saves on treatment cost further down the line, he says.

This will place cancer services in the UK "on a par with the best in the world".

Burnham says:

As we have seen in the past, the NHS can move mountains when it is given a very clear job to do.

Labour's national guarantees will be the "battleground" for the election.

The Tories would scrap the guarantees on day one of a David Cameron government, Burnham says.

Labour today puts its cards on the table.

10.14am: Alexander says voteNHS will build on the support of internet campaigns like Ed's Pledge and Back the Ban.

Labour is also launching a CameraON/CameraOFF campaign to highlight the difference between Tory rhetoric and Tory reality.

10.15am: We're onto questions.

Burnham says today's pledge is about creating new "testing capacity" within the NHS.

Q: How will the government achieve its plan to save £2.7bn by moving more care from hospital to home?

Burnham says the figures have been "carefully worked out" in the department of health. He can provide a full breakdown. (Cathy Newman from Channel 4 asked the question. On her FactCheck blog yesterday, she suggested yesterday that these figures are bogus.)

10.18am: Q: Haven't we heard about this seven-day target before? And aren't the Tories right about cancer outcomes being very poor in the UK?

Burnham says:

And I was sitting here thinking you did not have memories that long.

He admits Gordon Brown announced that one-week pledge before Labour's conference.

On survival rates, Burnham says the NHS has reduced cancer mortality rates among the under-75s by 19%.

10.21am: Q: When does the target get rolled out? And how much does it cost?

Burnham says he is "confident" it can be introduced by 2015.

Hospital trusts would strike deals with GP practices to deliver this.

It would cost £180m a year for the first three years. That's the cost of new equipment.

10.24am: Q: Is Labour planning a death tax on estates to pay for the national care service?

Burnham says there is a consensus that long-term care services need "fundamental reform".

The government published a green paper last year. It is consulting on options.

The story on this in the Guardian today is "inaccurate in a number of ways".

There is a "scurrilous campaign" being run by the Conservatives on this.

Q: Where is the Guardian story inaccurate?

Burnham says:

The Guardian story suggests a £20,000 flat levy. I'm not currently considering that as a lead option for reform.

He goes on:

The Conservatives have set their face against reform ... I believe the biggest mistake this country could be would be to step back from reform.

If the government abandoned reform, it would leave an "inadequate" and "unfair" system in place.

People are paying from their own pockets "in large amounts" to fund the cost of care.

10.29am: Q: What cancers will this target?

Burnham says it is particularly important to target lung cancer, bowel cancer and ovarian cancer.

Q: Where did the 10,000 lives saved figure come from? And won't faster diagnoses produce a bottleneck?

Burnham says GPs tell him they could do more tests more quickly if they have access to the right equipment.

Because patients aren't picked up quickly enough, they have to go into hospital for more invasive treatment.

By making this decisive shift towards a more preventative service, we can make better use of resources.

10.32am: Q: Where does the money come from? And will Labour have a pledge card?

Burnham says Alistair Darling has promised to protect frontline services for the next three years.

Alexander says health will be a central feature of the campaign.

We want there to be a very clear choice in relation to policy.

That's why he wants to ensure "adequate scrutiny" of the Conservative party.

Q: So will there be a pledge card?

Alexander says we will have to see whether there are five pledges, 10 pledges or more.

10.36am: Asked again about social care, Burnham says he set out three models in the green paper: a partnership model, a voluntary model and a compulsory model.

He says there is "no decision within government" as to which of those three models the government will promote.

The Tory proposal for people to pay an £8,000 insurance fee is "backward looking". It provides an incentive to put more older people in care.

10.38am: That's it. Here are the main points.

o Burnham denied being in favour a £20,000 levy on estates to pay for a national care programme. He said that the government was still considering its options. And he attacked the Conservative alternative as "backward-looking".

o He reaffirmed Labour's commitment to giving suspect cancer patients the right to diagnosis within a week. He claimed this would save 10,000 lives and he said it would cost over £500m.

o Alexander announced a new online campaign attacking Tory health policy.

Cross-posted from the Power 2010 blog:

If all it took to sort out our political system was to produce a list of proposals we'd have the best political system, ever.

Over the last few years, there has been no shortage of wish lists, most of which have promptly disappeared never to be thought of again.

So I'll readily admit to being a little sceptical of Power 2010 when it was launched intending to, yes, put together a list of proposals.

To its credit, though, Power 2010 has put together an imaginative approach: trawling widely for ideas, then getting a cross-section of the public together to discuss face-to-face their merits in order to create a list of ideas which is then opened up to the public's vote for winnowing down to a final list.

The selection of proposals up for vote are an intriguing cross-section of the different hobby horses ridden by different groups : English votes on English laws is right there next to proportional representation, directly elected Mayors listed alongside holding a referendum on the Euro.

That gives the process a real strength – and gives an extra incentive to vote, as most people will find not only ideas they like but also at least one idea that they don't.

The way to ensure it doesn't get through? Why to take part and vote for other proposals that you do like of course.

In my case, the proposal I don't like is the allowing a "None of the above" option on the ballot paper.

This can come in two flavours: one where "none of the above" can actually win an election, with no-one getting elected, and one where it can't.

If it can win, it means we'll end up with some people living in seats without elected representatives.

That not only gives power to the unelected instead (governing won't stop; it'll just be done more by unelected people), it means people who voted otherwise get their representation stripped away from them.

One person shouldn't be able to vote to deny another person having an elected representative.

So perhaps then "None of the above" works best where the votes for it are tallied, but someone gets elected anyway?

But that turns it into a superficial process: let people express their view and then ignore it.

Having officially declared "None of the above" totals may make people pause and think for a moment or two about the importance of raising turnout, but it's not as if anyone is short of information on that score already.

So "None of the above" is not for me. If you don't agree – then go and vote for it, and if you do agree - go and vote for other options.

#!/bin/bash
EDM=/home/parliament/edms
NEW=`find $EDM -mtime -1`
for i in $NEW
do
   `grep "Peter Bottomley" $i`
   if [ $? != 0 ]
   then
           echo "Peter Bottomley" >> $i
   fi
done

So far, alas, their quarry has eluded them. Just as he had never been seen jogging before the photograph had been taken, he has not been seen since. Some members of the paparazzi are now muttering that the original picture must have been a stunt.

What is more, one tells Mandrake that it is a mystery who took it, as the photo was uncredited.

Matrix, the agency which furnished newspapers with the picture, will tell me only that it was not taken by one of their photographers. "It was supplied to us by someone who wished to preserve their anonymnity," says Tom Smedley, of the company.

Certainly the Nike trainers that the PM was wearing with the Air Max logo showed little sign of wear.

Telling critics that their "hopes" that he would stand down were in vain, the Prime Minister insisted that he was fully fit to govern and went running regularly to maintain his health.

"I am healthy and I am very fit. I run a lot to keep fit and I will continue to keep fit. "I keep going. I have got a job to do. I have got work to do."

He considers himself to be a political heavyweight, but it appears that Gordon Brown doesn't like being drawn as one. It has emerged this weekend that he has complained to newspaper cartoonists that they draw him on the rather large side - "fat" was the word the PM used.

Mr Brown is known to have brought the subject up with at least two national newspaper artists, including The Independent's Dave Brown, pulling them up on their portrayal of him and insisting: "I'm not that fat." A touch vain? Perhaps.

But, in complaining, he joins a host of image-conscious politicians who fret over the way in which they are parodied in the media.

Journalists and media workers are coming together later this month to launch ‘Expose The BNP', a campaign aimed at revealing the undemocratic and racist nature of the British National Party.

Backing the campaign, James Macintyre, political correspondent for the New Statesman, said:

The political and media consensus appears to be that the way to tackle the BNP is to meet it half way, by talking up tough anti-immigration measures and airing this racist party's lies. This conventional wisdom must urgently be challenged.

The new campaign aims to investigate and challenge the BNP's attempts to construct a respectable public image, and to support media workers who refuse to work on programmes or material that break the reporting guidelines laid down by media trade unions.

Peter Hain MP, who will also be speaking at the event, said:

It is vital that journalists take a robust approach to the BNP. It was an outrage that the BBC gave the fascist, racist BNP the credibility they craved by inviting Nick Griffin onto Question Time. In the event, it became a shameful circus that boosted the far right party, and short-term BBC ratings.

In the run up to the general election and beyond, EXPOSE will provide well-researched information and background briefings for reporters, news editors and others in our industry in order to challenge the BNP's statements and spokespersons, and the racism and criminality at the heart of their organisation.

www.exposethebnp.com

Launch Public Meeting

Tuesday February 23: 7pm
Amnesty International Human Rights Centre, EC2A 3EA

Speakers include:
Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, columnist and broadcaster
Mehdi Hasan, senior editor (politics), New Statesman
Sunny Hundal, editor, Liberal Conspiracy
Peter Hain, secretary of state for Wales
Michelle Stanistreet, deputy general secretary, National Union of Journalists
Pat Styles, national official, Bectu, the media and entertainment union
Weyman Bennett, joint secretary, Unite Against Fascism

Recently, Labour Party members in Liverpool Wavertree chose Luciana Berger, a 28 year old Londoner who works as Director of Labour Friends of Israel, as their candidate for the next general election. This has led to criticisms that the Labour Party "parachutes" loyalists from London into safe seats.

Or as Neil put it, "the selection will only increase the sense that Labour regards the role of MP as some glorified graduate trainee programme, and sees constituencies as regional call centres, expected to dilligently enact the faxed dictats from central office...Perhaps the defeat of Ms Berger would send a symbolic - but important - message from Liverpool to London that the days of carpetbagging must end if Labour is to re-establish itself with what was once its heartlands."

Now the specific example is poorly chosen – Liverpool Wavertree is a marginal constituency, the number one target of the Lib Dems in the area. But the wider point deserves a fact check – is it actually true that Labour's traditional heartlands are suffering from the "rise of the carpetbaggers"?

To find out, I looked at the excellent UK Polling Report website of all the Labour seats where the current MP is standing down, they've selected a candidate, and the majority is more than 20% (i.e. which Labour are still very likely to win even if the Tories win the election overall). Guess how many were London-based New Labour loyalists with no connection to the area?

Of these twenty four seats, ten picked someone who was a current or former local councillor in the area, i.e. not a carpetbagger by definition.

Of the other thirteen, six grew up and went to school in the constituency where they are standing (not carpetbaggers); one was born in Hexham and is standing in Newcastle (not a carpetbagger); one works as a trade union official in Sunderland (not a carpetbagger). And one is a councillor in Warrington whose husband works for the outgoing MP (not a carpetbagger).

So that leaves five people who did not have local connections to their seat before they were selected. Stephen Twigg has revitalised the Liverpool West Derby Labour Party since the local party deselected Bob Wareing; Rachel Reeves is always mentioned as one of Labour's rising stars; Lisa Nandy is an expert in issues which affect refugee and migrant children; Yasmin Qureshi is an anti-war leftie who will be the UK's first female Muslim MP. None of them got selected as a result of a stitch-up by the party centrally.

And possibly the star of an extremely talented group is Kate Green, the former Director of the Child Poverty Action Group and now parliamentary candidate for Stretford and Urmston. Kate has spent her life campaigning for social justice, and Britain would be a better place if the government had listened more to her over the past few years and less to businessmen like Lord Freud, who is now the Tory "expert" on welfare.

When you actually look at who is getting selected in Labour's safe seats, it becomes clear that it is just silly to argue that "Labour regards the role of MP as some glorified graduate trainee programme, and sees constituencies as regional call centres, expected to dilligently enact the faxed dictats from central office".

I'm sure that the evidence won't kill off this myth, just as people go on about "sheep-like" MPs when in fact they are the most rebellious ever. But the fact is that the overwhelming majority of people who the Labour Party selects in its safe seats were either born and grew up there, and/or had already served in the area as local councillors. Those that weren't are as likely to be leftie critics of key government policies as loyalists, and all achieved success on their own merits, rather than as a result of London stitch-ups.

Education:

• B.A., Physics, 1963, University of Iowa


• M.S., Astronomy, 1964, University of Iowa


• Ph.D., Physics, 1970, University of Iowa

Publications

• Go to bibliography

Chapter 9 is possibly the most important one in the whole IPCC report - it's the one where they decide that global warming is manmade. This is the one where the headlines are made.

There is no scientific merit to be found in the Executive Summary. The presentation sounds like something put together by Greenpeace activists and their legal department. The points being made are made arbitrarily with legal sounding caveats without having established any foundation or basis in fact. The Executive Summary seems to be a political statement that is only designed to annoy greenhouse skeptics. Wasn't the IPCC Assessment Report intended to be a scientific document that would merit solid backing from the climate science community--instead of forcing many climate scientists into having to agree with greenhouse skeptic criticisms that this is indeed a report with a clear and obvious political agenda. Attribution can not happen until understanding has been clearly demonstrated. Once the facts of climate change have been established and understood, attribution will become self-evident to all. The Executive Summary as it stands is beyond redemption and should simply be deleted.

Rejected. [Executive Summary] summarizes Ch 9, which is based on the peer reviewed literature.

The European Commission has authorised, under EU state aid rules, plans notified by Sweden to provide a guarantee that would enable Saab Automobile AB to access a loan from the European Investment Bank (EIB). The Commission found that 82.8% of the guarantee to be provided by Sweden was in line with its Temporary Framework for state aid measures, which gives Member States additional scope to facilitate access to financing in the present economic and financial crisis (see   IP/08/1993  ).

European research ministers have made a commitment in San Sebastián to increase investment in R&D and to promote a culture of trust in scientists, without forgetting that research must be accountable to the public.

Catherine Ashton, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, and Vice President of the Commission, made today the following statement:

 The European Commission has authorised, under EU state aid rules, a Danish scheme providing export loans to Danish exporters and /or their clients who experience difficulties in accessing funding in the current financial crisis.

50% of European teenagers give out personal information on the web - according to an EU study - which can remain online forever and can be seen by anybody. Today, Safer Internet Day, the European Commission is passing a message to teenagers: "Think before you post!"

The European Parliament approved on Tuesday a set of key principles to be implemented in the cooperation agreement governing relations between the EP and the Commission. Commission President Barroso endorsed MEPs' demands, reflecting the new position of Parliament under the Lisbon Treaty.

1. The electric vehicle is the focus of the informal meeting of ministers of industry.What is the line of action of the Spanish Presidency in this matter?

President,

This is a time for boldness. This is a time to show our citizens that we care, and that the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty will make a real difference in our ability to serve their interests.