David Cameron must be under tremendous pressure and feeling the strain of the dangerous uncertainties of the economic crisis in Europe. Even so, he should be more careful with the unguarded comments he makes about fellow European Union leaders. Yesterday it was reliably reported that while in Mexico for the G20 meeting he had said that Britain would roll out the red carpet to welcome French businesses to London if President Hollande introduces a 75 percent wealth tax in France in the future. The President made some remarks about such a tax during his election campaign but it is absolutely and totally none of Mr Cameron's business and to go out of his way to refer to it in this way seems to suggest that whatever diplomatic skills the prime minister may once have possessed have now deserted him.
France is not an unimportant country even if they do some things differently from Britain yet Mr Cameron's latest remarks follow his snubbing of François Hollande when he visited London during his election campaign. The red carpet comment comes at the time the UK government is said to be taking new measures to stop aggressive tax avoidance which Chancellor George Osborne has called morally repugnant. How close would the red carpet encouragement to French businesses come to such evasion of M. Hollande's wealth tax - if he ever introduces it, that is?
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