Briefing from the Prime Minister’s Spokesman on: The budget and Britishness
Budget
Asked to give a sense of how much input the Prime Minister had on this Budget, the Prime Minister’s Spokesman (PMS) replied that obviously the Prime Minister had been consulted, as you would expect, but no more or no less than any other Government announcement of this significance.
Asked if it was a new tradition that the Prime Minister spoke to the Chancellor about the Budget, the PMS replied that he had no idea what the questioner was getting at. The Prime Minister, when he was Chancellor, obviously used to consult with his predecessor as well.
Put that according to Derek Scott the then Prime Minister used to say "give us a clue Gordon", the PMS replied that he would not necessarily say that that was the most definitive or authoritative account of the relationship between the previous Chancellor and the previous Prime Minister.
Asked if there was any book he could steer them towards, the PMS replied he was sure there would be plenty of books published that future historians would be able to pore over.
Britishness
Asked about the possibility of introducing a Britishness Bank Holiday, the PMS replied that our general position on the Goldsmith Review, as we said this morning, was that the Prime Minister was very sympathetic to the underlying principles of the Goldsmith Review. He thought it was important that we did more as a country to strengthen the sense of Britishness in British society. Lord Goldsmith had put forward a number of very interesting proposals, and obviously there would be a debate about this.
Asked when we could expect the debate to come to a conclusion, the PMS replied that it was a debate that was ongoing, so for example a lot of the underlying principles of the Goldsmith Review were reflected in the Government’s proposals on earned citizenship that was published a couple of weeks ago. There would not necessarily be a point in the future at which we would say that the debate was now finished, he was sure that it would be an ongoing debate.
Asked to be more specific on a Britishness day, the PMS replied that the Prime Minister thought it was an interesting proposal, but as with any Bank Holiday we also had to look at the impacts on the business and the economy as well.
Asked what the Prime Minister thought about calls for an extra Bank Holiday, the PMS replied that the Prime Minister thought there would be a debate about these things, and that we needed to do more to strengthen the sense of Britishness in society, but clearly we also had to take into account the considerations of the business community as well.
Asked whether it was appropriate to take into account the Americans as well when drafting the review, as Michael Chertoff was quoted in the index as one of the contributors, the PMS replied that of course we were going to look at how other countries promote citizenship and sense of national purpose in their countries as well.
Asked if the Prime Minister considered taking the day off as the embodiment of Britishness, the PMS replied that there would be a debate about all of these matters and we would consider the journalist’s question a contribution to the debate.
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