Downing Street Says » 2005 » November

» Thursday, November 24, 2005

Prime Minister’s Day

Prime Minister held high level round table meeting - including representatives of the UN, NATO, Aid agencies, Pakistan Community representatives, MPs, private sector representatives, and British contributors to the appeal. Announcement today about extra £25 million for humanitarian relief, on top of £33 million already provided. Also to announce fund for helicopters and through NATO, a deployment of 86 British military engineers trained for high altitude operations. All this was to highlight the Prime Minister's concern that we did everything we could to help people get through the winter.

Briefing took place at 16:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Security Briefing

Asked if the briefing on security to Cabinet today had been a long planned meeting, or was it something that had recently come up, the Prime Minister's Official Spokesman (PMOS) replied that it was not an overnight operation, but rather, a chance to update the Cabinet in the same way that representatives updated the Cabinet Committee about ten days ago. As then, it was a sobering, realistic assessment of the threat we faced. It also gave Cabinet a chance to express its full support for the police and the intelligence agencies in the very good work they were doing.

Briefing took place at 16:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Angela Merkel-Europe

Asked if there had been any progress on the EU budget during the meeting today between the Prime Minister and Chancellor Merkel of Germany, the Prime Minister's Official Spokesman (PMOS) said that today was not about detail. Chancellor Merkel had only been doing the job for 3 days, so today had been about introductions and getting to know where we were overall. The time for detail would be at the December summit. Put to him that we could therefore assume that Germany wouldn't support us on the budget, the PMOS said that question was entirely wrong. It had not been that kind of meeting. Today had been about the context within which we tried to move forward on the detail. It had not been a negotiation on the budget.

Briefing took place at 16:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Angela Merkel Meeting

Asked what might be on the agenda for this afternoon's meeting, and also how was her working relationship with the Prime Minister rated, and was she an important ally for the EU Budget, the PMOS said that it was polite and wise to let Chancellor Merkel to speak for herself. What was important was that Britain and Germany recognised that we were at an important point on Europe, especially with regards to deciding a future direction of Europe and in meeting the opportunity and the challenge of globalisation.

Briefing took place at 16:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Pensions

Asked about whether the Government was rejecting the proposals in the Turner report on pensions, the PMOS said that the Prime Minister had spelled out the position very clearly when he said that despite what people may have heard we had an open mind about Turner, we believed it was a serious piece of work and would be responded to in a serious way. This morning John Hutton had laid down the principles on which any response would be based, which was that it should be fair, affordable and should encourage people to save. We should all wait for the report to be published and then judge it on the report. Asked if the disparity between the public and private views of the Turner report put him an awkward position, the PMOS said that he did not feel in any awkward position at all. He felt quite happy waiting for the Turner report to be published and waiting until we had decided our response. The basis of it was that we ruled nothing in and nothing out.

Briefing took place at 16:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (2)

Pensions

Asked if the Prime Minister believed that the Chancellor was trying to "destroy" the Turner Report before it had been published, the PMOS replied that his understanding was that the Treasury was disputing that interpretation this morning. As John Hutton would lay out, the important thing was that we waited for Adair Turner's proposals before commenting, and also that we underlined the principles on which our response would be made. Those principles were that our proposals would be fair, affordable, encouraged people to save more.

Briefing took place at 16:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (4)

Pakistan Meeting

Asked for a description of today's meeting between the Prime Minister and officials from Pakistan, the PMOS said that the purpose of the meeting had been to try and make sure that everything had been done to help Pakistan through the winter it included representatives of the UN, NATO, Aid agencies, Pakistan Community representatives, MPs, private sector representatives, and British contributors to the appeal. (see introduction for details) Asked if part of the reason for the meeting had been the high level of former Pakistani nationals who lived in the UK, the PMOS said that was a very fair question. Obviously there was a need which in and of itself had to be met, but there was a linkage between the large Pakistani community here and Pakistan which underlined our role in trying to be helpful.

Briefing took place at 16:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

EU-Canada Summit

Asked what might come up at the EU-Canada summit later today, the PMOS told the journalist that the common issues that occur when several world leaders meet were: terrorism, trade with WTO, development, our G8 agenda and climate change. That would form the basis for the discussion.

Briefing took place at 16:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Gas supplies

Asked if there were any emergency plans for gas supplies, the PMOS said that on the one hand, we were being accused of holding secret meetings because there was about to be a fuel crisis, and on the other hand, we were accused of not doing enough. The PMOS said that somewhere in between lay the truth in the sense that there had been a lot of thought and effort put into this, and as a result of that, we were in a better position than ever before to anticipate and address any issues that arose.

Briefing took place at 16:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

EUROMED Summit

Asked for further information regarding the EUROMED Summit in Barcelona, the PMOS told journalists that in terms of the Barcelona Summit, what was important was to first of all recognise the importance of the Summit. This was the first gathering of this collection of countries at Head of Government level, and it brought together thirty five EUROMED countries, including twenty five EU countries. It also included other countries around the Mediterranean such as Turkey, Israel, Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, the Palestinian Authority, Jordan, Syrian, Lebanon, Bulgaria, Romania, Croatia, Libya and Mauritania.

Briefing took place at 16:00 | Read whole briefing | Comment (1)

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» Thursday, November 24, 2005

Prime Minister’s Day

Security Briefing

Angela Merkel-Europe

Angela Merkel Meeting

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Pensions

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EU-Canada Summit

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