Unease over Cameron's EU veto and Ed Miliband's Eurosceptic posing lead our teatime newslinks

UNEASE OVER DAVID CAMERON'S VETO

• "David Cameron has defended his decision not to block the use of EU institutions by a new eurozone fiscal pact. He told the Commons the pact "places no obligations" on the UK, but he would take "legal action" if the future role of the European Court threatened UK. Conservative MPs have accused the PM of weakening the stance he took last year when he vetoed EU treaty change." - BBC
• Full text of Cameron's Commons statement today - Number 10
• "We’re back to business as usual, ministers and mandarins cutting deals, and the people of this country ignored. If you’re a Eurosceptic there’s only one show in town after yesterday, and that’s calling for a referendum. We cannot leave SW1 people to make euro policy anymore" - Douglas Carswell MP quoted by PoliticsHome (£)
• "Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith asked for reassurances about whether British interests are properly protected under the new non-EU treaty. My information is that he is still seeking further reassurance from lawyers - which means that he is not yet satisfied. Owen Paterson also made comments at Cabinet, which will remind people there are two big eurosceptic beasts at the coffin shaped table." - Joe Murphy

David Cameron's Europe veto change and a new push for an in/out referendum lead our teatime newslinks

DAVID CAMERON'S VETO QUESTIONED

• MPsETC: The veto "is no more", it "has ceased to be", it is "bereft of life", it "rests in peace"
• Cameron arguing for 'growth agenda' at EU summit - BBC
• Columnist Andrew Lilico: The Government has capitulated on the "veto" - so now what?
• "He could, however, take other EU countries to court over the inappropriate use of the EU institutions. As Iain Duncan Smith noted yesterday, the institutions are the property of all EU member states, including the UK which happens to pay roughly 12% of their budgets." - Mats Persson
• "There isn’t normally a prime ministerial statement after an informal European Council like this one but one Tory MP told me he was sure there would be an attempt to table an urgent question and drag Mr Cameron to the Commons. “He’d better explain quickly,” one Tory MP said, “or he’s going to get his backside kicked.”" - Gary Gibbon
• "Guido hears that the Eurosceptics and other assorted agitators on the Tory benches will be meeting to war-game and plot around the possible compromise on EU institutions and the European Stability Pact in advance of the PM’s statement tomorrow." - Guido Fawkes

The political debate over Stephen Hester's £1m bonus from RBS leads this evening's teatime newslinks

STEPHEN HESTER'S £1M BONUS FROM THE ROYAL BANK OF SCOTLAND

• Osborne defends Hester's bonus, saying it isn't for the Government to decide, but would be "a lot less" than those of other bank chiefs - Telegraph
• However the bonus is condemned by Mayor of London Boris Johnson, who said he was "at a loss to justify" it - Press Association I Daily Mail
• 'Boris attacks £996,000 bonus for chief of ‘Soviet’ RBS' - Times (£)
• PlayPolitical: Boris Johnson: "I’m at a loss to justify" Stephen Hester's £1million bonus from RBS
• "London mayor Boris Johnson calls award 'bewildering' and Labour leader Ed Miliband describes it as 'disgraceful" - Guardian
• "The political furore picked up on Friday when Ed Miliband, Labour leader, accused Mr Cameron of having “nodded through” the bonus" - FT
• "David Buick, a partner at BGC Partners, says Stephen Hester has been "magmanimous" in refusing his bonus last year and "deserves every nickel" that he receives from the bank" - Telegraph 
• What has Stephen Hester achieved? - BBC
• Melissa Kite: 'Whose bonus is it, anyway?' - Daily Mail
• Jonathan Jones: "If the government had felt it could do more, it probably would’ve done more" - Spectator
• David Davis: "We should distinguish a little more between wealth creation and the activities of some of our bankers, which amount to wealth extraction, and wealth extraction in their own interests at that" - Spectator

Cameron's €urozone speech and Clegg's tax cut speech lead our teatime newslinks

DAVID CAMERON'S €UROZONE CRISIS SPEECH

• "David Cameron urged eurozone leaders to follow Britain's "bold and decisive" action in dealing with its crisis as he warned that the continent was facing a "perilous" moment. Addressing the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, the prime minister said three things needed to be done urgently in 2012 – "Greece, banks and firewall". He said the Greek situation needed to be resolved, banks recapitalised and an agreement reached on a new bailout fund for troubled eurozone countries." - Guardian
• "The PM also bashed Brussels over the Tobin Tax, also a favourite of Angela Merkel. He said it was “madness” to even think about at a time when the EC itself says it will cost €200bn and 500,000 jobs (importantly the Commission completely denies that it has said this about its current plan, and for the Financial Transaction Tax)." - Faisal Islam
• David Cameron urges European leaders to 'be bolder' - BBC
• "Reading Cameron's speech to the suits in Davos, one thing stands out: he's in no mood to stop ‘lecturing’ the eurozone, as Nicolas Sarkozy would put it. The whole thing is saturated with firm advice for our European brethren" - Peter Hoskin
• Cameron's prescriptions for Europe miss the point (again) - New Statesman

NICK CLEGG'S SQUEEZED MIDDLE TAX CUT SPEECH

• 
• WATCH: Nick Clegg: Squeezed middle should be given "more tax cuts, more money back in their pockets"
• Clegg to Cameron and Osborne: Cut taxes on the poor or defend the wealthy. It's your choice. - ToryDiary
• "There are no free lunches here and I think many of us believe the best way now to boost business confidence is not pushing it up to £10,000 to put some more money in the household pockets but to actually go for payroll taxes." - David Ruffley MP at PoliticsHome (£)
• "Unfortunately, being Nick, the Deputy Prime Minister then went on to say something utterly and perniciously misleading. "We had a situation (until recently) where a hedge fund manager paid less tax on their shares and capital gains, than their cleaner did on their wages." No, Nick, he DID NOT pay less tax than his cleaner. He paid tax at a lower rate – which is a very different thing." - Janet Daley
• "Coalition is a process of negotiation. If Mr Osborne gives Mr Clegg this one, what might he get in return? Team Dave is already thinking about the next legislative session, and in particular the damage a drawn out fight over Lords reform will do to the Coalition's programme." - Benedict Brogan

MORE DEFENCE CUTS

• "Another 3,000 civilians are to be axed from the Ministry of Defence to help it bring down an estimated 2bn overspend in its budget, the guardian has learned. Philip Hammond will be forced to make the embarrassing admission in the coming days amid fresh concern within the MoD about how to balance its budget." - Guardian
• "The taxpayer faces a bill of more than £850 million for making thousands of troops and staff redundant from the Ministry of Defence. The money will go on pay-offs for those axed as a result of cost-saving measures." - PA

IN BRIEF

• Diane Abbott, a shadow health minister, "has resigned from a cross-party group on counselling given to pregnant women by abortion providers, dismissing it as a "front" for those who want it outlawed." - BBC
• Scrap metal laws to be tightened to tackle theft - BBC
• Mick Jagger ditched David Cameron for Boris Johnson - Business Insider
• Refused honours: who were the people who said no? - Guardian
• LISTEN: Lord Mandelson: Ed Miliband is "struggling to invent a new left-of-centre political paradigm"
• Local government: Frank Field calls for "Premier League" for those on housing waiting list
• David Skelton on International: Mitt Romney's inability to attract blue-collar voters mirrors David Cameron's problems in 2010

> GO BACK TO TODAY'S FRONTPAGE AND FOLLOW MUSTBEREAD FOR LINKS THROUGHOUT THE DAY.

PMQs, growth figures, and speeches by David Cameron and Boris Johnson lead our teatime newslinks

REACTIONS TO PMQS

• "Today was one of those PMQs when you sensed that both sides were fairly happy with how it had gone. Ed Miliband turned in one of his stronger performances, cleverly splitting his questions and so allowing himself to have a go at both the economy and the coalition’s troubled NHS reforms." - James Forsyth
• "There’d been a clear win sitting there for Ed Miliband. But for some reason, he didn’t seem to want to take it. Still, he’d learnt one thing; at least his crap economic strategy is finally a match for David Cameron's." - Dan Hodges
• "For the first time since last summer, Ed Miliband got through the session without triggering talk of a leadership crisis." - Lloyd Evans
• "How much does today's session matter in the grand scheme of things? Not a lot. But it's a useful corrective to those who have started to talk as if Mr Miliband has one foot in the political grave." - James Kirkup
• ToryDiary: Miliband attacks weak growth figures, but Conservatives fight back on benefits cap
• WATCH: Ed Miliband: "Growth has been flat-lining in our economy since well before the €urozone crisis"

NEGATIVE GROWTH FIGURES

• The full figures from the ONS website
• "Britain probably is in the middle of a light recession now. We won’t know for sure until April. But today’s Q4 GDP number was doubly disappointing, if not, a great  surprise. For a start it was a larger fall than expected, at -0.2%. It showed weak construction and production figures." - Faisal Islam
• "...the economy has essentially been stagnant for six months. Over the course of 2011, growth was 0.9 per cent of GDP – far below the full throated roar back to action that the Government was counting on... this means the recovery in the UK is now weaker than the one that followed the Great Depression." - Daniel Knowles
• ToryDiary: George Osborne would still get wet in a thunderstorm with an umbrella... but I'd prefer he had one
• ThinkTankCentral: Think tanks give continued support for deficit reduction, but urge more short-term growth measures

DAVID CAMERON'S ECHR SPEECH

• "Cameron will call for greater "filtering" to allow the court to clear a backlog of 150,000 cases. He will say that decisions should be made more quickly on the admissibility of cases – 97% of UK cases between 1959 and 2010 were deemed inadmissible. He will also say the court should cut down on "repetitive" cases" - Guardian
• Our post-war human rights settlement has degenerated. David Cameron must press for urgent reform of the ECHR - Blair Gibbs
• Andrew Boff on Comment: The ECHR - putting the figures in context
• Amber Rudd MP on Comment: Day two of the Council of Europe's meeting

BORIS JOHNSON'S BUDGET SPEECH

• ToryDiary: Boris Johnson's re-election budget presents his manifesto for transport, housing and crime
• Ken Livingstone: only 30 per cent believe him on fares - Andrew Gilligan
• London’s fares CAN be cut - LeftFootForward

SCOTTISH INDEPENDENCE REFERENDUM CONSULTATION LAUNCHED

• The referendum question will be: "Do you agree that Scotland should be an independent country?"
• "The Scottish government's position is for independence. Therefore that option will appear on any ballot paper in a straightforward manner. We set out our proposal for the question in the consultation document. However, this is a consultation with the community of the realm of Scotland and it is imperative that the referendum is seen to be fair, democratic and inclusive."
• WATCH: Alex Salmond: "I think we could win the argument and win the referendum"

GOVERNMENT LOSES COURT APPEAL ON SOLAR SUBSIDIES

• "The government lost its appeal on Wednesday against a judge's ruling that its cuts to solar power subsidies were illegal, suggesting thousands of homes and businesses will now be able to claim the higher payments." - Guardian

IN BRIEF

• What about a 45p rate? Downing Street debates an interim tax reduction - Benedict Brogan
• "An increasing number of Conservative MPs are starting to think the unloved health reforms ought somehow to be killed." - New Statesman
• Is would-be Tory MEP Rupert Matthews the victim of a witch hunt? - Simon Richards
• Gordon Brown to release a new book later this year

> GO BACK TO TODAY'S FRONTPAGE AND FOLLOW MUSTBEREAD FOR LINKS THROUGHOUT THE DAY.

Cameron "has confidence" in Huhne, as decision on speeding fine gets closer

CAMERON "HAS CONFIDENCE" IN CHRIS HUHNE AS HIS SPEEDING FINE CRISIS GETS WORSE

• A decision over whether to charge Huhne with an offence could be make in weeks - Telegraph
• The Sunday Times has dropped its challenge to a court ruling ordering it to hand over emails to police relating to speeding claims against Chris Huhne - BBC I Guardian
• Cameron "has confidence" in Chris Huhne - Telegraph
• The Telegraph timelines Chris Huhne's crisis - Telegraph
• Pete Hoskin: 'What odds, this morning, on Chris Huhne retaining his ‘Survivor of the Year’ crown at this year's Spectator Parliamentarian Awards?' - Spectator

Cameron defends free markets in a speech on capitalism

CAMERON'S SPEECH ON CAPITALISM

• "Open markets promote morality": In today's speech on capitalism, Cameron robustly defended free markets, describing them as the “best imaginable force” for improving “human wealth and happiness” - Telegraph
• ToryDiary: David Cameron's moral capitalism speech emphasises free markets and the Tories' popular capitalist roots
• "We'll make the market fair as well as free" - Telegraph
• The UK must build a better economy, says Cameron - BBC
• Cameron sets out a vision for "popular capitalism" - Independent
• PM attacks Labour's "Faustian pact" with the city, which encouraged "a debt-crazed economy" - Evening Standard
• Former RBS chief Fred Goodwin could be stripped of his knighthood, says Cameron - Guardian I Times (£) ... but says the decision is not in his hands - Telegraph
• Dan Hodges: 'Ed Miliband and David Cameron's battle over Cuddly Capitalism is a fatuous waste of time' - Telegraph
• Matthew Elliott: 'Cameron has talked about 'moral capitalism' but now he needs to act' - Daily Mail
• James Forsyth: "This reveals something important both about Cameron personally and how he sees the economy. The people that Cameron respects are not the CEOs of established companies but the entrepreneurs who are creating dynamic, new companies" - Spectator
• Daniel Knowles: "This speech is exactly what Dave has been saying since at least 2009. And now, as ever, the gap between David Cameron's actions and his rhetoric is (perhaps thankfully) a yawning chasm" - Telegraph
• George Eaton: "Though eloquent and historically rich, Cameron's speech was also overly abstract and often contradictory. He damned Labour's "Faustian pact with the City", conveniently forgetting that himself and George Osborne were calling for more, not less, deregulation in 2007" - New Statesman

Highlights and reaction to today's PMQs top this evening's newslinks

PMQS

• ToryDiary: Miliband finds some form as he attacks the Government on unemployment figures
• Miliband calls on Cameron to adopt a new jobs strategy to tackle unemployment - Telegraph
• Leaders clash over jobless rise - BBC
• Cameron warns off "colonial" Argentina over Falklands - Times (£)
• PlayPolitical:  David Cameron: "The future of the Falkland Islands is a matter for the people themselves"
• The Beast of Bolsover, Dennis Skinner labelled a "dinosaur" by Cameron - Times (£)
• Live blogs for PMQs as it happened - Guardian I BBC

European human rights court blocks the deportation of terror suspect Abu Qatada

UK JUDGES RULE THAT RADICAL CLERIC ABU QATADA CANNOT BE DEPORTED

• Human rights court in Strasbourg block Abu Qatada deportation - Guardian
• 'European court overrules Britain on terror detainee' - New York Times
• 'Terror cleric Abu Qatada cannot be deported to Jordan because it breaches his human rights, European judges rule' - Daily Mail
• The Telegraph timelines Abu Qatada's legal battle to stay in Britain - Telegraph
• Abu Qatada and terrorist deportations - BBC
• Joshua Rozenberg: "Abu Qatada can't be sent back to Jordan. But the government will take some comfort from Strasbourg's judgment" - Guardian
• Ed West: "Qatada has no rights upon Britain anymore than I have rights upon Jordan, and by granting him such the judges are not just undermining justice but the very sovereignty on which justice and human rights are built" - Telegraph
• Michael Burleigh: 'Get this creature out of here' - Daily Mail

Downing Street dismisses the suggestion of a royal yacht as a gift for the Queen on her Diamond Jubilee

CAMERON RULES OUT THE TAXPAYER FUNDING A NEW YACHT FOR THE QUEEN'S DIAMOND JUBILEE

• Cameron's spokesman said: "we don't think it would be an appropriate use of public money at the present time" - Telegraph
• 'Cameron slaps down Gove on royal yacht for jubilee' - Times (£)
• Clegg also ruled out the suggestion, saying:  "this isn't top of their [the public's] list of priorities for the use of scarce resources" - Guardian
• "Clegg's strong slapdown will lead many to believe the Libs leaked Gove's letter to Jeremy Hunt. Chris Huhne, of course, has form on ringing the Graun to diss the Tories. Surely he's not behind this one...?" - PoliticsHome
• What could you buy for the price of a yacht? - Guardian
• James Forsyth details Gove's Roayl yacht proposal in full - Spectator
• Ed West: 'Buying the Queen a new yacht is a daft idea: there are lots of other projects we can spend £60 million on' - Telegraph