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» Thursday, June 30, 2005

Respect

The Prime Minister's Official Spokesman (PMOS) told journalists that there had been a Cabinet Committee on 'respect' which had been chaired by the Prime Minister, and attended by Charles Clarke, David Milliband, Tessa Jowell, Peter Goldsmith and Lord Falconer from the Cabinet. Other Ministers including Jackie Smith and Hazel Blears also attended. They had discussed how Whitehall departments would cooperate and coordinate on such issues as school discipline, binge drinking, parenting, dealing with noisy neighbourhoods and anti-social behaviour.

Briefing took place at 15:45 | Read whole briefing | Comments (10)

US Aid

The PMOS gave the Government's reaction to President Bush's announcement today that the US would more than double aid to Africa by 2010. He said it was an important and welcome step and created a real momentum for a successful outcome at Gleneagles. It built on the President's increases in US ODA in his first term, his Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief and the Millennium Challenge Account. We welcomed the President's focus both on governance and democracy, as well as on the key issues of girls education and malaria. This reflected the comprehensive programme which the Prime Minister had proposed to the G8. We wanted the G8 to sign up to providing universal access to malaria prevention and treatment and to train millions of new teachers for Africa. The President's announcements today were a big contribution to those important aims.

Briefing took place at 15:45 | Read whole briefing | Comment (1)

Olympics

Asked about Mrs Blair's role in the Olympic bid the PMOS said that it was too early to brief on our strategy for the Olympic bid. All he would say was that the Prime Minister, Tessa Jowell and Mrs Blair were all determined that we went flat out to do everything we could to support the bid, and we would.

Briefing took place at 15:45 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Illegal Immigration Statistics

Asked if it had come as a surprise to the Prime Minister that Home Office were able to produce statistics on illegal immigration given that he had said that such figures were impossible to calculate, the PMOS put it on record that the Prime Minster could not have known the figure when he was interviewed by Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight. The research had not been finished until this month, as he understood it the Head of Research at the Home Office had said that even he had not known the figure at the time of the interview. Asked if the Prime Minister had known that the research was being undertaken, the PMOS said that Des Brown in January of this year had said in Parliament, that work was ongoing to see whether a method could be applied and people were aware of that, but not whether we were anywhere near a figure. Equally, as everybody had made clear, this was still a guestimate, it was one estimate using one possible methodology, therefore it could not be seen as an accurate or definitive figure.

Briefing took place at 15:45 | Read whole briefing | Comments (13)

Cabinet

The Prime Minister's Official Spokesman began by briefing the press on this morning's Cabinet meeting. He told journalists that they had discussed Europe with the Prime Minister reporting back on the speech he had made last week. Jack Straw gave an overview, looking forward to the UK presidency of the EU. The Deputy Prime Minister reported on his visit to four East European capitals where he told Cabinet that not only had the Prime Minister's speech made a real impact, but also that there had been an acceptance of the need for modernisation and a proper debate. Cabinet went on to discuss the G8 and the run up to Gleneagles. With regards to Africa we were driving forward on both fronts in terms of aid and also on the governance side. On climate change, as the Prime Minister had said, everything was still there to play for in terms of our approach. Tessa Jowell briefed Cabinet on the Olympics and the upcoming trip to Singapore, stressing that we were going flat out for the bid, but also stressing that the bid had already resulted in a lasting legacy in terms of sport in this country.

Briefing took place at 11:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

EU

Asked about the contents of the EU white paper, the PMOS said that we had now made it part of the routine that every six months we produced a white paper updating the House on EU developments. That's what this was. It obviously had greater significance because of the fact that our presidency started tomorrow and tomorrow the Prime Minister would be meeting the EU Commissioners. Asked if there would be anything 'new' announced tomorrow, the PMOS said that last week in Brussels, the Prime Minister set out his vision. Today partially and also tomorrow, we would do a press conference with President Barroso of the Commission, giving a bit more of an idea of how we wanted to translate that vision into something more tangible during our presidency. This wouldn't be setting up a knee-jerk process but it was about taking forward the debate in tangible form.

Briefing took place at 11:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

G8

Asked what the Prime Minister thought about the RMT's plans to hold a strike at the same time as the Live 8 event, the PMOS said it was up to the RMT to justify and to explain its actions, we had always made it clear that we believed that the Live 8 event was a significant event and everybody should do everything they could to reflect that significance. Their actions should be judged against that standard.

Briefing took place at 11:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

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