Gordon Brown

If you take energy and climate change, you really cannot deal with the problems with energy and climate change without European co-operation at a high level. If you take digitalisation, it's an obvious area where European co-operation can actually make a difference.

Though builders may build, in the main they follow the plans of architects. Teachers teach, but they must have a text. Politicians govern, but only upon the flow of commentary that raises them up or casts them down.

Finding a 'sacrificial lamb' on whom to tag blame for complicated problems is an important instrument in the toolkit of politicians, because it deflects blame for the nation's economic woes away from their own regulatory lapses, economic mismanagement and coddling to labor unions.