Set and Match

The French have: the European Central Bank (Jean Claude Trichet); the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (Jean Lamierre); the World Trade Organisation (Pascal Lamy); can Dominique Strauss-Kahn complete the set at the International Monetary Fund? And will Sarkozy's economic view win the match?

The visceral revulsion any normal person experiences when forced to consider Labour and its Leader has a cerebral counterpart in the European Union's determined opposition to any of the economic nonsense on stilts vaunted by the UK interregnum government.

Pragmatism, commitment to growth, good faith, give and take - all those conservative virtues, have crossed the Channel leaving England and its disaffected once constituent nations to power-seeking, to profit-taking, to rent-seeking in conditions of no competition benefit dependents, to undemocratic appointed governance, and to exploitation.