It really shouldn’t surprise me by now, and yet it does every time: just how little respect British newspapers have for their readers.
Today’s front page “exclusive” in the Observer:
How serious are the revelations in this memo? Serious enough to potentially derail the Tories’ efforts to form a government. Or so the Observer would have us believe:
David Cameron’s hopes of forming a coalition with the Liberal Democrats were dramatically undermined last night by the leaking of a top-secret letter outlining the hardline Eurosceptic stance he and William Hague planned to adopt in government.
There’s just one problem with this letter’s Shock! Horror! revelations: the memo doesn’t reveal anything new at all because everything in it was clearly spelled out in the Tories’ election manifesto and repeated frequently on the campaign trail.
The Observer:
Exposing the massive gulf between Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg and the Conservative leadership on Europe, Hague says he would demand the right to repatriate powers over criminal justice as well as social and employment policy during the first term of a Tory government – demands many EU leaders say they would resist.
Tory Manifesto:
The steady and unaccountable intrusion of the European Union into almost every aspect of our lives has gone too far. A Conservative government will negotiate for three specific guarantees – on the Charter of Fundamental Rights, on criminal justice, and on social and employment legislation – with our European partners to return powers that we believe should reside with the UK, not the EU. We seek a mandate to negotiate the return of these powers from the EU to the UK.
The Observer:
Hague planned to tell his EU counterparts: “Rest assured that we seek engagement, not confrontation. But our aim is to achieve these commitments during this parliament.” He would also tell his first foreign ministers’ meeting “we will never join the euro” and conclude: “You will find us firm but fair, playing a leading role, fighting our corner, practical and straight-talking.”
Tory Manifesto:
A Conservative government would never take the UK into the Euro. Our amendment to the 1972 Act will prevent any future government from doing so without a referendum.
Several (equally unappealing) possibilities:
1) the reporters and editors at the Observer didn’t bother to read the Tory manifesto in the run-up to the election or listen to any of the campaign speeches;
2) the reporters and editors did both of these things, but assume that the Liberal Democrats didn’t;
3) the reporters and editors assume that their readers have the attention span of a gnat and can’t remember anything we read or heard last week.
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