Cameron was missing

France and Germany sat symbolically next to each other at the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony in Oslo on Monday. That was as it should be because it was their leaders in the early 1950s who saw the need for an association which would prevent a third war erupting between them within half a century. In time their vision became the European Union which the Nobel Foundation honoured for “transforming a continent of war into a continent of peace” -- as the Peace Prize chairman Thorbjern Jagland put it in his speech on Monday. Yes, France's President Hollande and Germany's Chancellor Merkel sat next to each other and acknowledged the applause of the distinguished gathering. But where was David Cameron to represent Britain which, after all, had saved Europe from a fate that would have made later reconciliation impossible? On Monday he chose to put a lunch engagement with members of the Westminster press gallery ahead of the Oslo ceremony and sent Nick Clegg instead. With a misjudged sense of humour he thanked the journalists for “giving me an excuse not to be there for the great jamboree in Oslo” and then went on to say that he wanted to try and find “the right role” for Britain's future in Europe “where we are writing the rules, rather than just obeying them”. Mr Cameron's attitude to Europe is distressingly crude, lamentably short-sighted and wholly counterproductive.