By Marc Glendening

Sometimes in politics there is a time for cutting through the mushy triangulated BS of modern mainstream politics. Europe is the question that now brooks no unambiguous answer. Yet the political elite, supported by the many fellow travellers who follow in its slipstream, want, for their different reasons, to keep a dense fog hanging over this issue.

I don't think Malcolm X was specifically speaking about the EU when he said, "there will be no controlled show... no flim-flam... if you're afraid to tell the truth you don't deserve freedom," as captured in No Sell Out, Keith Leblanc’s 1983 hip hop tribute.

However, those of us who want a real debate about the EU, regardless of our different preferred outcomes, should now seek to apply Mr X's commendable clarity of approach to this issue. This is why my organisation, the all-party Democracy Movement, is launching a new campaign, Fast Forward: beyond the outdated EU. We want to take head-on the commission/big business,

The opening three months of 2013 just about sum up the flavour of this coalition: one-third desperate unity, two-thirds mutual loathing.

It was in order to address the latter that David Cameron and Nick Clegg began their year by striking a note of togetherness. Their midterm review was supposed to inject a bit of sprightliness into their ailing alliance. Instead it served to highlight their broken promises, underlining the challenges of running the country together now there is more of this government in the past than there is ahead.

The differences bubbled away throughout January. Boundary changes saw the Lib Dems stick to their guns and defeat the Conservatives, triggering "fury" among Tories desperate to get away from their despised colleagues in Whitehall. Discovering that this was the issue, of all the others, where the junior party were finally discovering their backbone was too much for some Conservative MPs, who spent at least a week quivering with anger. On gay marriage, the

By Thomas Wright

The idea that Britain should use its influence to remake the European Union is not an unreasonable one. There is a strong argument that the EU is on an unsustainable path — the eurocrisis is creating a dangerous divide between the periphery and core, the eurozone is encroaching upon the EU, there is a yawning gap between the people and their leaders, and Europe has much to do if it is to be competitive in a world dominated by the US and China. Britain is a country with the diplomatic skill and heft to move the EU in the right direction.

Unfortunately, this idea is not on the table. What prime minister David Cameron has offered is a referendum that strikes many international observers as diplomatically irrational.

Regardless of the pros and cons of membership, the four-year wait till a vote is held creates immense uncertainty about the British economy and Britain's role in the world. Investment decisions, diplomatic engagements and countless other initiatives will be

"The most important thing for any of us is the people that we love and that is what makes us human," David Miliband told me during the final stages of the leadership campaign he hoped would see him crowned leader of the Labour party.

"That's not something we go around advertising. Now, we then love our football teams, we have our holiday we enjoy, we have our favourite places and favourite people. That's something that comes out in due course.

"I think there's a real danger of underestimating the British public in this. They want to see beneath the surface. And it's important that we respect that. They want consistency and they want clarity. The real person comes from those virtues."

For a man whose private thoughts and public actions have been at the centre of what makes him fascinating for so many years, this was a revealing observation. Miliband was on the brink of being usurped by the ambition of his younger brother - and the decisive influence the trade unions hold over the system

By Michael 'Akkarin' Kitchen

The Free Church of Scotland recently condemned a proposal to expand the institution of marriage in the country. Due to the wording of the proposals, which will allow for other religious and humanist institutions to perform wedding ceremonies, the church believes it will open the door for Jedi ministers to perform weddings. While they described the plan as "completely nonsensical", we believe there is a legitimate place in society for Jedi weddings.

Temple of the Jedi Order (TotJO) is one of a number of communities that go by the name of 'Jedi'. We do not represent everyone within that community, only our particular order.

A wedding is the joining together of individuals for a lifelong commitment of love and caring. What is important in such a ceremony is the people that are being married, not who officiates the joining between them; the minister is the vessel of their love.

The more people there are to promote and support the love and care between

It is the sort of proposal which would send the Dowager Countess calling for her smelling salts and the Earl of Grantham steeling himself for social change with a stiff upper lip. After centuries of macho oneupmanship, a Conservative backbencher is now suggesting ending the system of primogeniture for good.

The rule of primogeniture, which sees the succession of hereditary peerages pass to a male even if the son is born after a daughter, has long been a headache for dispossessed females. The problems it poses have driven Sunday night entertainment from Pride and Prejudice to Downton Abbey.

Now it's the 21st century and most viewers of these costume dramas will assume this particular headache is a thing of the past. Women have come a long way. Even the monarchy is changing its succession rules, meaning Kate Middleton's first child - regardless of whether it is a boy or a girl - will become the third in line to the throne.

The stakes may not be as high as in the past, for families of

By Nick Pickles

As the bell tolls for press freedom, the realisation that a whole host of tiny websites, including Big Brother Watch, would be covered by the provisions of the new press regulator is dawning on Westminster.

On Monday, the Lords will vote on the legislation "underpinning" the Royal Charter on press-self regulation. They will determine who is to be a 'relevant publisher'. At present this risks catching broadly any site that has more than one author, carries news or information about current affairs, or gossip about celebrities, and has some kind of editorial control.

We urgently tried to garner support for an amendment to exclude small organisations from the provisions of what is already becoming an unwieldy and unpredictable piece of legislative horse trading, and finally secured one late in the day on Friday.

As the tin pot dictators of the world eagerly await the opportunity to introduce their own 'statutory underpinning' to shackle the media holding them to account,

The newspapers, depending on their political leanings, will either write about the 'downgraded chancellor' or his 'aspiration nation'. Their stories about his 'every little helps' Budget will go down a treat in the pub. But his measures, while populist and giving him something to talk about for an hour today, do not resolve the terrible fix the British economy now finds itself in. Here's five reasons why your life has got a lot worse since the chancellor delivered his fourth Budget yesterday.

The economy is in big, big trouble

You knew this already. But you didn't know how bad it's getting till yesterday lunchtime.  Last December the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) had estimated growth in 2013 would amount to 1.2%. This was itself a big downgrade. Today it halved that assessment to just 0.6%, a drastic reduction. Osborne blamed headwinds in the global economy and the eurozone for the hiccup, and suggested the situation would deteriorate further if the eurozone continues to