16 February 2016 - David Cameron visits Brussels for crucial EU talks

David Cameron’s hopes for a deal with the European Union
(The Economist, 15/02/2016)

David Cameron, the British prime minister, is heading to Brussels for a crucial summit with fellow European Union leaders later this week. He hopes to secure a deal that meets his demands for EU reforms in four specific areas. These are promises to improve EU competitiveness and promote free-trade deals; an end to Britain’s commitment to ever closer union; guarantees that countries in the euro will not discriminate against those (like Britain) that remain outside the single currency; and, most controversially, limits on in-work welfare benefits being paid to EU migrants into Britain. If he gets his deal, Mr Cameron will announce his plan to hold a referendum on EU membership in four months’ time, on June 23rd.
Mr Cameron is insisting that his deal will mean a big change in Britain’s relations with the EU, that it will have legal force and that reform will be a continuing process. He accordingly argues that Britain is better off staying in the EU and has even added that this matters for its security. His Eurosceptic critics, many of them in his own Tory party, dismiss his reforms as trivial changes that deliver neither the fundamental change in Britain’s relationship with the EU he once promised nor the full-on treaty change he said he would achieve. They also claim that, if it were once set free from the burden of EU red tape, Britain would be better off, and they insist that security is a matter for NATO and bilateral intelligence-sharing, not for the EU.

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David Cameron stuck in middle as concern rises about UK deal across EU
Ian Traynor (The Guardian, 15/02/2016)
The rest of Europe is getting cold feet over David Cameron’s new deal. Three days before the most critical EU summit the prime minister has attended, reservations are being voiced from Poland to Portugal about the concessions being made by the rest of the EU to try to keep Britain in.
“It’s very complicated. More time would have helped,” said a senior official who has led negotiations with Britain for a key EU state. “They’ve all been a bit optimistic. This can easily go wrong.”
He cited Portugal, Belgium, Luxembourg, Italy, and the European parliament as having substantive problems with the draft deal offered to the British, while the eastern European bloc of Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and the Czech Republic have even bigger issues as they are to bear the brunt of the welfare changes tabled to help Cameron win his in/out referendum.
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David Cameron set to call EU referendum on Friday after backing down over Cabinet 'gag'
Peter Dominiczak and Matthew Holehouse (The Telegraph, 15/02/2016)

David Cameron looks set to call the EU referendum on Friday after being warned that he faced a Cabinet revolt if he attempted to wait until after the weekend in order to gag eurosceptic ministers.
Downing Street on Monday agreed to hold a Cabinet meeting on Friday if, as expected, Mr Cameron is able to secure a final deal with EU leaders at a Brussels summit.
Mr Cameron will use the Cabinet meeting to lift “collective responsibility” rules, meaning that eurosceptic members will finally be able to speak out and say that they are backing the campaign to leave the EU.
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