 The Civil Service is a vital economic asset to the UK - firstly, in the way it creates a framework for excellence in service delivery and secondly, in how it helps organise the best way to deliver modern public services on which both businesses and individuals depend. |
| But let no one be under any doubt that the scale of the challenge that Europe faces in this emerging global economy is immense and the practical pace of our collective action to meet these challenge to date has just been too slow. |
| The challenge to our national economies and the collective economy of Europe will become - with the growth of China and the continuing productivity growth of the US - even more intense in the decades to come. |
| My view is that targets, properly constructed and applied across public services have been fundamental to past successes and will be an essential part of sustaining progress into the future. |
| Road testing the effects of regulation on European business must become second nature to the European Union. |
| We must seek to persuade member states and institutions that better regulation in Europe does not mean cutting health and safety in the workplace, nor does it mean dismantling social standards. |
| Greater personal choice, individually tailored services, stronger local accountability, greater efficiency - these are all central to the new direction of travel we have set for our public services. |
| If we took Chaucer's writings at face value, we'd have to conclude he was a complete drip. |
| But we need to show that the EU can modernise itself, can adapt to the needs of its citizens, can take their views into account. That will be our ambition for the UK Presidency. |
| For too long nurses have been undervalued, restricted in what they could do, with too few career opportunities in clinical practice. For far too long, nurses have endured a pay system that has held them back - both professionally as well as financially. |
| But effective regulation at the European Union level can make a massive contribution to achieving our shared goals of improving competitiveness, jobs and growth. |
