» Thursday, November 30, 2006

Cabinet

Asked if it was a full house in Cabinet today meaning was the Chancellor there, the PMOS said yes he was. Asked for a read out of Cabinet, the PMOS said that there had been a presentation by John Hutton on pensions and there was a presentation from Geoff Hoon on making a case for Europe, how it is perceived in the UK and how to challenge that assumption.

Briefing took place at 9:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Fraser Brown

Asked if there was any mentioned at all, even in a side or in passing over the Chancellor's youngest son, the PMOS said no. As was made clear last night, this is a personal and private matter and any messages will be conveyed in that way.

Briefing took place at 9:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Extradition

Asked if there was any reaction to the courts decision this morning to extradite Babar Ahmad and Haroon Aswat to the United States to face terror charges, the PMOS said it was a matter for the courts but it did show a determination to deal with these matters.

Briefing took place at 9:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Afghanistan

Asked if the UK would be sending any more troops to Afghanistan, the PMOS said in terms of Afghanistan the important thing to recognise was that as the Secretary General said yesterday, after the Nato meeting we are 90 percent of the way to getting the military contingent that we need. In terms of the future those matters are kept constantly under review.

Briefing took place at 9:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Exchange Rate

Asked as the pound was the highest it had ever been against the dollar since the ERM disaster has the Prime Minister raised this with the Chancellor, the PMOS said that as the reporter was inviting him to commit professional suicide by commenting on exchange rates he would refrain from doing so.

Briefing took place at 9:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

» Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Birthday Parties

The Prime Minister's Official Spokesman (PMOS) confirmed that the Prime Minister, like the rest of the NATO leadership, would not be attending any birthday party that would not be taking place in Riga tonight. The PMOS said that he especially wanted to make that clear to the Daily Express, and the Prime Minister would not be resigning as a result of not being invited to a birthday party that was not taking place!

Briefing took place at 9:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Afghanistan

Asked what further discussions there had been about troops being sent to Afghanistan from other countries, and how many more would be sent, the PMOS replied that he was not going to brief on how many would be sent, but what was important was that Poland had sent an extra 1000 troops. The PMOS said that the important things about this summit was that first of all, there was an acceptance that this was crucial not only to Afghanistan, but to NATO and NATO's future. As the Prime Minister had said in his contributions last night, NATO had to not only say it, but mean it as well. In terms of the flexibility that was now being introduced by lifting some of the caveats around NATO's troops, that was important progress.

Briefing took place at 9:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Eurofighter

Asked how worried the Prime Minister was at the prospect of the Eurofighter deal collapsing because the Saudis had suspended negotiations, the PMOS said that he had not commented at all on the Saudi case because there was an ongoing case, and it would be wrong for him to do so. Obviously, we were well aware of the case.

Briefing took place at 9:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Turkey

Asked about Turkey and how difficult the negotiations would be, the PMOS replied that there were two important points. Firstly, this was not the EU Council, as that would come later in the month. What we used today's meeting for, however, was to find out what Turkey's position was in the run-up to the EU Council. We were aware of the position of other EU countries, and what we were therefore trying to work out was how we helped move things forward. People were aware of the difficulties, and what we needed to find was a way forward, and we would use the period between now and the EU Council to try and find that way. If we could help in our way, then we would.

Briefing took place at 9:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

» Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Russia-COBR

When asked how important or unimportant in the grand scheme of things was the ongoing saga of the Russian man, as there was a Cabinet Office Briefing Room (COBR) meeting this afternoon, the Prime Minister's Official Spokesman (PMOS) replied that with regards to the COBR meeting, as he had said yesterday, COBR met because this was a cross-departmental issue. There were health concerns, as well as Home Office concerns too, and therefore, people should not read anything more than COBR being a sensible bureaucratic mechanism for discussing these matters. COBR played an important role, but it should not be overstated, although the PMOS said that he knew how over-excited the journalists got by COBR.

Briefing took place at 8:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

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