Newslinks for Sunday 13th February 2011

9.15pm ToryDiary update: Norman Lamont makes case for AV threshold in tomorrow's Times

7.30pm Andrew Lilico on Comment: The Banking Sector needs six structural reforms

7.30pm WATCH: Liam Fox on the Coalition's efforts to strengthen the military covenant

4.45pm ToryDiary: Cameron likely to appoint über-moderniser as his head of strategy

12.15pm WATCH: Vince Cable tells Andrew Marr that public understands need for spending cuts

ToryDiary:

• 81% of Tory members say AV should only pass if 40% take part in referendum
• More members dissatisfied with Warsi, Spelman and Clarke than are satisfied
• Grassroots give support to muscular liberalism, Big Society and HiSpeed rail

Luke de Pulford on Comment: Why the Big Society should appeal to traditional Tories

Also on Comment, John Phelan: Ed Balls is the Peter Risdale of Economics

Local government: 27% blame councils for service cuts, 29% central Government

Liam Fox urges all Tories to back Coalition's mission

  "At the last election, no party was given a mandate to govern alone, however much any of us might wish it to be different. David Cameron’s decision to form a coalition was necessary in the national interest. It follows that the primary responsibility of that coalition is to eliminate the deficit." - Liam Fox in The Sunday Telegraph

Government has turned Oliver Letwin (back) into a Eurosceptic (and he's known as The Contraceptive by David Cameron)

"Oliver Letwin, Cameron’s mild-mannered and cerebral Policy Minister, has become so frustrated by this constant interference that he has told colleagues he thinks Britain should leave the European Union if it won’t give us all the opt-outs the Government wants." - James Forsyth in the Mail on Sunday

"David Cameron has a new nickname for Oliver Letwin, his policy chief: "The Contraceptive". Why? Because Letwin now spends his time stopping Euro policies being conceived in Downing Street. Without him, the British government machine would get on the smallprint sofa with Brussels and breed policies like rabbits. Cam didn't expect all this. But he was recently shocked to find that HALF of his government's policies originated in Brussels." - Fraser Nelson in the News of the World (£)

Sunday Express: Sack Ken Clarke

"ConservativeHome, the forum for Tory Party debate, has suggested the Justice Secretary may have to be sacked and that MPs should have a free vote on withdrawal from the European Convention on Human rights. ConservativeHome is absolutely right on both counts. Mr Clarke has become a semi-detached member of the Cabinet and if his continuing  pro-European stance is making it more difficult for the Prime Minister then he must go. The issue at stake, the national interest, is simply too crucial to be sacrificed by pandering to the vanity of one man." - Sunday Express leader

> Yesterday's ToryDiary: One man, more than any other, stands between David Cameron and the Tories adopting a sensible, popular policy on Europe

David Cameron defends the Big Society in an article for The Observer

"the big society doesn't apply to one area of policy, but many. For example, if neighbours want to take over the running of a post office, park or playground, we will help them. If a charity or a faith group want to set up a great new school in the state sector, we'll let them. And if someone wants to help out with children, we will sweep away the criminal record checks and health and safety laws that stop them." - The Prime Minister writing in The Observer

More on the Big Society

• Nick Clegg refuses to give public backing to Big Society - Mail on Sunday
• "David Cameron will attempt to relaunch his flagship "Big Society" project by stressing that the programme has a "moral" purpose which runs through his entire Government." - Sunday Telegraph
• "David Cameron is to come out fighting in defence of his Big Society dream, launching a week-long drive to persuade the public that the policy is not a sepia-tinted vision of British life used as a cover for devastating spending cuts." - Independent on Sunday
• The Big Society starts with our wedding vows - Janet Daley in The Sunday Telegraph
• John Redwood: "The test of the Big Society idea over the next four years is this. Will there be more mutuals, more charitable giving and activity? Will groups of public sector employees set up their own institutions to further the public good?  Will there be new or more ways of joint working, and better ways of furthering the public good by private means?"

Culture Secretary warns councils he may take control of libraries

"Ministers are dusting off little-known powers to allow them to control library budgets and run the book-lending services themselves. The powers will be used if councils, trying to find millions of pounds of cuts, ignore Government pleas not to slash library services to the bone. Jeremy Hunt, the Culture Secretary, has statutory powers under the 1964 Libraries Act to intervene over closures." - The Sunday Times (£)

Bill Cash and Bernard Jenkin complain after Tory whips attempt to silence Sarah Woollaston MP on NHS reforms - Observer

The high court's decision on the Building Schools for the Future programme must not knock the Education Secretary off course - his reforms are too important - Tim Montgomerie in The Sunday Telegraph

Coalition in brief:

• Gay couples may soon be able to tie the knot in church - Observer
• Grant Shapps summons lenders to summit to ignite housing market - Sunday Express
• Tory pledge on midwives not being met - Independent on Sunday
• News that 10 City tycoons had given £13.2m to Tory coffers has come at an embarrassing time for the prime minister - Observer

Latest opinion polls

• YouGov gives the Labour Party a 10% lead. Overnight, ComRes put the Labour lead at 6%.
• Two-thirds says cuts will hit poor hardest - Independent on Sunday
• As covered on ToryDiary last night, ComRes also confirms a swing to the Yes2AV campaign.

Matthew d'Ancona: What Osborne's second Budget must achieve

"[The Chancellor] cannot make the cuts painless, any more than he can satisfy the public’s taste for bankers’ blood. His Budget cannot change the fact that the country is still in the early stages of deeply unpleasant remedial treatment. What he can do, however, is look like a man with a plan. What he can do is look in control." - Matthew d'Ancona in The Sunday Telegraph

Osborne and Cameron are tactically flexible enough to beat Miliband and Balls - John Rentoul in the Independent on Sunday

Andrew Rawnsley: The Coalition is too inwards-looking

"In theory, two parties, representing as they do different political traditions, parts of the country and electoral constituencies, ought to be more attuned to and responsive to the voters. It is of concern to thoughtful people at the top of government that it has not so far turned out that way. The amount of time spent negotiating with each other has made the coalition inward-facing when it needs to be much more public-facing. They forget at their peril that the most important negotiation in politics is always with the voters." - Andrew Rawnsley in The Observer

Why we should believe Nick Clegg when he promises to restore liberties stolen by Labour - Henry Porter in The Observer

Ed Miliband: The old Toryism is back

"As for "red Toryism", "compassionate Conservatism", that funny tree logo, the huskies and "going green" – these were the cloaks they wore to confuse the voters. What we are witnessing now is the recontamination of the Tory party. In the past week, voters have seen more clearly than ever this Conservative-led government in its true colours: a single-issue government making huge sacrificies of the things we value on the altar of deficit reduction. Recontaminated. In deep blue. A traditional Tory government." - The Labour leader in the Independent on Sunday

David Cameron has returned Britain to era of confrontation, says Ed Balls

"Mr Balls cited an open letter to The Times signed by more than 90 senior Liberal Democrat councillors, complaining that the Government cutting too far, too fast, as evidence of the damage that was being done. He said that the coalition's top leadership – such as Mr Cameron, Chancellor George Osborne, and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg – were out of touch with the realities of life facing ordinary voters." - The Sunday Telegraph

Labour upbeat in Wales - Wales on Sunday

Buckinghamshire Conservatives refuse to donate to fund for London-Birmingham train line - Mail on Sunday

> This story was covered by ConHome at the end of last month.

CCHQ "enforcers" sent to Liam Fox's constituency - Mail on Sunday

Lord Ashcroft: Olaf Schmid's death reveals why tours for bomb disposal operators must be curtailed

"High-risk bomb disposal operators share my concerns that six-month tours are unreasonably long and arduous. Sean Rayment, The Sunday Telegraph’s defence correspondent, ends his new book, Bomb Hunters, with a plea from Staff Sergeant Kim Hughes, who was awarded the GC on the same day as Staff Sgt Schmid, to cut the lengths of tours by at least a third – to four months." - Lord Ashcroft in The Sunday Telegraph

Other Comment:

• Denying prisoners the vote gives them a strong signal that we have no interest in their rehabilitation - Paul Vallely in the Independent on Sunday
• Blogging is good for literacy - India Knight in The Sunday Times (£)

And finally... The Mail on Sunday has the inside story of the Tories' Black and White fundraiser ball including the £25,000 opportunity to play golf with England cricket captain Andrew Strauss.