ToryDiary: Rather than seek to move the voters rightwards, Cameron and Osborne are moving themselves leftwards, into the centre of British politics
Shane Frith on Platform: "While coalition governments will have challenges, they also offer opportunities. None more so than to transform the image of the Tory Party."
Local government: Mixed omens from Con/Lib Dem Town Hall pacts
Melanchthon on CentreRight: Good things about the coalition
International: Sarkozy predicts Cameron will become "pro-European"
Laughing and joking at Downing St press call, best buddies Dave and Nick present the Liberal Conservatives - Daily Mail
> Yesterday's ToryDiary: David Cameron says he and Clegg rejected the idea of minority government because it was "so uninspiring"
Coalition deal: Tories retreat from commitment to scrap FSA
"The Financial Services Authority (FSA) was given a stay of execution yesterday, after the Tories had to scrap plans to disband the watchdog under a deal brokered with their Liberal Democrat coalition partners.
Chancellor George Osborne was preparing to wind down the FSA, dividing its responsibilities between the Bank of England and a handful of new agencies. But while the Bank will assume ultimate responsibility for macro-prudential regulation, the FSA will continue to oversee individual financial institutions." - City AM
"George Osborne said during the campaign that he wanted to cut the £167 billion deficit largely though public spending cuts, raising only 20 per cent of revenue through tax rises. The Liberal Democrats, by contrast, signalled that they wanted closer to 30 per cent of the burden to be shouldered by tax. The seven-page coalition document released yesterday commits the new Government to making public spending cuts carry the “main burden” of reducing the deficit, opening the way to unplanned Tory tax rises." -Times
VAT is set to rise under the new coalition government, according to a BBC survey of influential economists - BBC
Coalition deal: Five year fixed-term parliaments
"The Lib-Con government will move immediately introduce five-year fixed-term parliaments, with the next election due on Thursday, May 7, 2015, although a parliament can be dissolved if 55 percent of MPs agree." - Times
House of Lords will be swept away in reforms and replaced with elected Senate -Daily Mail
Coalition deal: City AM sees too much anti-bank, anti-business sentiment in the LibCon deal
Coalition deal: A welcome from Paddy Ashdown"The Tories, under David Cameron, seemed to understand the demand from the electorate for a new kind of politics better than many in Old Labour, and responded to it with speed, understanding and a good deal of statesmanship. Those of us who learnt our politics in opposition to the Tory party of the Thatcher era found this surprising, and in some cases even quite hard to deal with. But our negotiators, and those from the Tory party, showed that these were different times, by producing a remarkable coalition document which contained commitments to political modernisation, voting reform, fair taxes, such as the £10,000 threshold for income tax, a clean environment and civil liberties, all of which any Lib Dem can be proud." - Paddy Ashdown in The Telegraph
> Yesterday's ToryDiary summary of the coalition deal
Coalition CabinetThe Telegraph sees May and IDS as surprise appointments: "Mr Duncan Smith, the former Conservative leader who was deposed in 2003, has been charged with implementing tougher welfare rules. The work of his Centre for Social Justice has underpinned Mr Cameron’s analysis of Britain’s “broken society”. Mrs May becomes only the second woman to hold the post of Home Secretary after Jacqui Smith. As Conservative Party chairman in 2002, Mrs May war ned that the Tories were seen by many as “the nasty party”. She was shadow work and pensions secretary before the general election."
"Oliver Letwin and Francis Maude miss out on full Cabinet jobs but both have been given policymaking roles at the heart of the Government. David Willetts and Sir George Young also only have the right to attend Cabinet, while being appointed to jobs that they shadowed." - The Times
"The lack of women in the new Government is shaming for British politics." -Times leader
'David Cameron's kitchen cabinet' - The Independent profiles the Prime Minister's inner team
The Guardian: The coalition deserves a chance"The first days of a new government are rarely typical. For the moment, goodwill, good sense and good grace are much in evidence. Reasonable people will rightly accentuate the positive while remaining watchful. These are hard times and Britain faces hard choices. Inevitably the hard pounding will soon chip and bruise the new coalition's shiny novelty and generous intentions. Then the world will turn and things will get harder. Right now, however, the new government deserves its chance and the new politics its moments in the sun." - Guardian leader
But in The Guardian Lord Adonis does not expect it to last: "Forget the five-year fixed-term parliament. As in other democracies with "fixed" terms, there will be provision for an early election in the case of government collapse. This Cameron-Clegg coalition brings together Britain's biggest spenders and biggest cutters, its most ardent Europhiles and Europhobes, its strongest proponents and opponents of state power, its most ardent neocons and liberals. If it lasts five years, water will start to flow uphill."
Benedict Brogan: There will be trouble ahead"Conservative MPs who have fought the Lib Dems are looking green around the gills at having to swallow stuff that a week ago they were telling us would destroy the nation. For them, the only good Liberal is a dead one, preferably suffocated by the mendacious campaign leaflets that are the yellow peril's stock-in-trade. High-profile jobs for Liam Fox and Iain Duncan Smith will not easily calm the anger of the traditional Right. Many Lib Dems, in turn, are appalled at finding themselves in bed with David Cameron, when they had spent the night before chatting up that Labour bloke they'd always fancied." - Benedict Brogan in The Telegraph
Lord Ashcroft set to publish review of Tory campaign - Andrew Pierce in theDaily Mail
ConservativeHome's review of the Tory campaign was published yesterday. Read it here.
"Foreign Secretary William Hague will meet US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Washington on Friday in his first overseas visit in the job. "I think getting to grips with these Afghanistan and Iranian issues is right at the top of our agenda," he said. A visit to Europe would follow "very quickly", he added." - Express
And finally... Samantha Cameron aims to move her family into 10 Downing Street as soon as possible"Samantha Cameron will move into Downing Street with the couple's two kids "as soon as possible", it emerged yesterday. The PM and his wife decided not to be apart, despite fears she wanted to live elsewhere. They chose the same apartment above No11 used by the Browns and Blairs. Pregnant Samantha, 39, had her first tour yesterday. But she will not leave the family home in Kensington, West London, for a few weeks so as not to disrupt the schooling of kids Nancy, six, and Elwen, four." - The Sun
ToryDiary: Full Cabinet line-up announced
LeftWatch: David Miliband declares he is a candidate for the Labour leadership
3.15pm The deal has been published and is available to download
Seats and Candidates: Lib Dems will press ahead with challenge to Anne McIntosh at the delayed election in Thirsk and Malton
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