Friday 8th February 2008

What CentreRight contributors are saying about Rowan Williams:

• Douglas Murray: "I've just been speaking with a Muslim friend who has always opposed sharia law.  'Where does it leave me', he asks, 'when the Archbishop of Canterbury is calling for sharia?'"
• Conor Burns: "His comments came on the day that Christians were marking Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent.  A time when Christians reflect on the Passion and death of Jesus and the greatest feast of the church - the resurrection from the dead of Christ. That at this time the leader of the established Church is making speeches about the inevitability of sharia law into Britain is breathtaking."
• Alex Deane: "Where does it leave those of us in the C of E who feel that our beloved church is slipping further and further off the sphere of reality?"

Other CentreRight.com selections:

• Peter Franklin wonders if Mike Huckabee's fusion of traditional values and social justice represents the future of American conservatism.
• Simon Chapman discusses the greying of Britain. Old is the new black apparently.
• Jim McConalogue has more thoughts on Commons' scrutiny of the Lisbon Treaty.

3.30pm PlayPolitical: David Cameron advocates more public places in which children can play safely

Platform: Shadow Immigration Minister Damian Green MP on the PM's failure to back up his assertions

ToryDiary: A portfolio-by-portfolio guide to the shadow cabinet's hares and tortoises debate and Clegg sets out his conditions for working with a minority Conservative government

CF Diary: Why Michael Rock is standing for Chairman

Guardian feature on Boris' prospects

"The leadership acknowledge that Johnson started badly but now believe Livingstone can be defeated. They argue that efforts to portray Johnson as a racist have backfired and argue that his position is strong enough now to withstand any of their candidate's familiar gaffes. But there is nervousness, too, among the Cameron camp." - Guardian

Clegg would work with Conservatives on 'liberal' reforms

"Nick Clegg says his Liberal Democrats could support a minority Conservative government after the next election, if David Cameron proposes genuinely “liberal” reforms in areas such as civil liberties, public service reform and the environment. The Lib Dem leader on Friday sets out conditions under which his party would back the first Queen’s Speech of a minority government if the next election produced a hung parliament." - FT

"It may be tempting for politicians to argue that each scandal is separate from the others, but the British people simply don't see it that way. It's time to admit there's a pattern here. The relationship between money and politics is rotten, and it is hollowing out our whole political system." - Nick Clegg in the Times

Thinning blue line

"The number of police officers in England and Wales will have to fall as the current 140,000 level is unsustainable in the long term, an official report on policing gave warning yesterday. Sir Ronnie Flanagan, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary, said that it was not necessary to have so many officers and that many jobs could be done by civilians instead." - Times

Why gambling is the one vice the government encourages

"More than 250,000 people are already addicted. These casinos won't be peddling family entertainment, just promoting desperation. Even Ian Fleming admits in the first line of Casino Royale that, "The scent, smoke and sweat of a casino are nauseating at three in the morning". Does Mr Brown want to be remembered as the Prime Minister who got the nation hooked on casinos? He should take a long, hard look at his dependency on this tax revenue and admit that gambling is far more worrying than forgetting to brush your teeth or letting your teenager get drunk once in a while." - Alice Thomson in the Telegraph

Rowan Williams

"The Archbishop of Canterbury was embroiled in a fierce political and religious row last night after he called for aspects of Islamic sharia law to be adopted in Britain." - Telegraph

"Muslim radicals will view it as the bending of the British establishment to fundamentalist pressure; that will hardly make for the social cohesion which lies behind Dr Williams's thinking. The present informal arrangement of sharia councils is preferable in the current context to their elevation into courts. On this most inflammatory of subjects the archbishop would have best kept silent." - Telegraph leader

"The established Church was founded to break from the parallel jurisdiction in Rome. It is extraordinary to hear the head of the established Church, 500 years later, argue for a return to a parallel jurisdiction for another faith. We all wish to live in harmony. There are important questions to be answered about how to make Muslims feel more welcome in British society. But this is an act of appeasement." - Times leader

Online reaction: Damian Thompson, Cranmer, Alex Deane and Julia Manning

Every British family liable for £3000

"Gordon Brown's reputation for economic competence has been dealt a severe blow as £100 billion of taxpayers' money used to shore up Northern Rock was added to the national debt. The Treasury has broken one of its jealously guarded borrowing rules after the National Statistician ordered Alistair Darling, the Chancellor, to put the stricken bank's liabilities on the Government's books. The total amount of public money involved in rescuing Northern Rock is the equivalent of saddling every family in Britain with £3,000 of debt." - Telegraph

Legacy of Tory T E Utley

"Utley was a high Tory who made jokes, a reverent Anglican who was also deeply irreverent, and the great danger of giving some sketch of his political ideas is that one might inadvertently make him sound dry. He combined high seriousness, and a profound understanding of the need for authority, with comic and even democratic tendencies." - Andrew Gimson in the Telegraph

The influence of TV on children

"One can’t really blame Cameron for trying. Sportacus has single-handedly achieved more in the fight against obesity than any dreary political campaign. In Iceland, where LazyTown is made, it has been credited with bringing about a 12.5 per cent increase in fruit and vegetable eating among children. In 2006 it was the No 1 children’s show in the US." - Carol Midgley in the Times

Please use this thread to highlight other interesting news and commentary...