Fraser Nelson

If David Cameron were to divide Europe up, he’d make some crude distinctions. There would be the basket cases, like Italy, Spain, Greece, France — examples, by and large, of how countries should not be run. Then there’d be the former Soviet bloc, sceptical about Brussels because they recently escaped a remote, controlling bureaucracy and don’t want to repeat the experience. Then come the good guys, the people with whom he intends to reshape the continent: the Germans, the Dutch and the Scandis. This is the group that the Prime Minister has started referring to as his ‘Northern Alliance’. Mr Cameron has, until now, had little interest in the machinations of the European Union.

How many FTSE 100 chief executives support Labour? How many FTSE 250 chief execs back Ed Miliband? Difficult questions for Chuka Umunna, Labour's Shadow Business Secretary, in his outing on the BBC's Sunday Politics today. Labour’s plan to jack up the top rate of income tax to 52 per cent (up from 47 per cent) has sent a fairly clear message about its attitude to business. Digby Jones, an ex-CBI boss who served in Gordon Brown’s government, has summarized Miliband’s position as: 'if it creates wealth, let’s kick it.' Stuart Rose, ex-M&S ceo, says the 50p tax borders on 'predatory taxation.' The head of the London Stock Exchange says Milband’s 50p tax (or 52p, when you count National Insurance) will deter entrepreneurs.

Compare and contrast. We have Chris Smith, chairman of the Environment Agency, whose shortcomings can now be seen covering 23,000 acres of Somerset. And yet, when visiting yesterday, he did not say sorry (the word he used instead was ‘proud’). He says he sees no reason for him to resign, even when it is clear that the failures he has overseen have led to a spectacular catastrophe (we call for his resignation in this week's Spectator). Exhibit B is Mark Harper, who has just quit as immigration minister because he failed to spot that his cleaner had lied about having permission to work in Britain. She went to far as to produce papers saying she had indefinite leave to remain.

I have my criticisms of the Obama administration, but it does seem to have the right idea about the European Union’s diplomatic efficacy. His top diplomat for European and Eurasian affairs, Victoria Nuland, has been taking a lot of stick after she was caught on tape (or hacked, as we Brits would call it)  discussing the Ukraine problem with the US ambassador in Kiev, Geoffrey Pyatt. She was rude about the EU, but the condemnation of her language seems to have overlooked her central point. The EU has been trying to muscle in on talks about Ukraine’s pro-democracy moves. It could have helped by offering membership to Ukraine, but it prevaricated – and now wants to insert this prevarication into the negotiations.

David Laws' attack on his former BFF Michael Gove is leading the news bulletins today, and rightly. Its wider significance lies in that the Liberal Democrats have decided it’s time to start picking fights not just with Tories in general but Michael Gove in particular. So Gove, having offered all that hospitality to David Laws, finds the guy he thought was his clansman wield the dagger on the instructions of his commander. This isn’t quite Westmister’s equivalent of the Glencoe Massacre, but the dynamics of the coalition have changed – in precisely the way that James Forsyth outlines in his political column this week. The LibDems' support halved soon after they went into coalition.

Sally Morgan’s claim this morning that No10 is trying to purge non-Tories from quangos doesn’t ring true to me. Last time I checked, Team Cameron was still putting Labour types into quangos, oblivious to the game that Labour has been playing so long for so well. Exhibit A is the egregious Chris Smith, a former Labour Culture Secretary who has somehow ended up chairing the Environment Agency (whose incompetence can now be seen covering 23,000 acres of the in Somerset Levels). In the Labour years, the Labour Party was very good at deploying its own people to charities and quangos – making a good government-in-exile to attack a Tory government for cuts, etc.

Dominic Raab is one of the most impressive members of the Tory back benches, able to pick a string of good fights and – even rarer – able to win them. He’s a black belt and seems to regard politics as karate by other means. He’s a 3rd Dan in fighting and a 10th Dan in rebellion. But his latest victory – forcing the government into a humiliating climbdown over deporting foreign prisoners – was one too far. Thanks to Labour votes, his amendment failed so all he really achieved was embarrassing the Home Secretary. Yes, Raab can fight. Yes, he can win. But in my Daily Telegraph column today, I suggest it’s time for him (and other rebels) to stop.

There was a spat at Davos this morning between George Osborne, the Chancellor, and Larry Summers, ex-US Treasury Secretary (and very occasional Ed Balls adviser). The gist of it was that Summers is not a fan of Osborne's austerity, and implied America's stimulus had allowed it to get back to peak GDP more quickly that austerity-struck Britain. Osborne was too polite to tell him what nonsense this is, but I’d like to show Coffee Housers two graphs that make the case. First, the stimulus. It was an abject failure, as readers of Nate Silver’s book, The Signal and the Noise, will know. US unemployment was running at 7.3 per cent at the time and White House economists said that, without a stimulus, it would go to 9 per cent. But with the stimulus, it would peak at 8 per cent.

If you think bankers do a bad job of banking, just wait until government tries its hand. This seems to be what Ed Miliband is proposing today: a Labour government would set up two new banks, to challenge the existing five big ones. And so his 1970s revival continues. There’s no evidence that new banks would help much, as the Bank of England Governor has already indicated. But as I say in my Telegraph column today, Ed Miliband isn't too worried about lack of evidence. He's proposing to be a different kind of political leader. His list of ‘predators’ – ie, nasty businesses to whom he promises to give six of the best - grows longer all the time.