The Government will have the "smallest margin possible" for wriggling out of a pledge to hold a referendum on significant EU treaty changes, Europe Minister David Lidington said today.

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The South Pacific nation celebrates the election of a 'commoner' as prime minister

Saudi Arabia's elderly King Abdullah flies to the US today for checks for a back ailment, and Crown Prince Sultan is returning from holiday. Political stability in the monarchy is of global concern. The Gulf Arab state controls more than a fifth of the world's crude reserves, is a vital US ally in the region, a major holder of dollar assets and home to the biggest Arab bourse.

It may have been a long time in coming – and when it did, the formal announcement post-dated the actual event by a month – but the announcement of Prince William's engagement to Kate Middleton comes as a welcome bright point in a generally austere world. For supporters of the monarchy, who remain a majority in this country, the coming marriage provides the best guarantee that the institution will continue into a new generation as the force for stability that it has been during Queen Elizabeth II's long reign.

Nothing that has appeared in this book is surprising in itself. The surprising thing is that it should be published at all. In Sweden, this kind of information just doesn't get printed, not even in the tabloids. It's circling as gossip and of course it's on the internet. But it's never been like Britain. There are some scandals, but in general everyone is given their privacy.

David Cameron today hailed a "new chapter" in the history of defence co-operation between Britain and France.

With that monolithic name and a press release packed with words like "widescreen", Monarchy have you braced for a yawn-a-thon.

Falkland Oil & Gas (FOG) has not found anything at its Toroa well to the south of the islands, sending the Aim-listed group's stock into freefall yesterday.

It shapes our humour, politics and even fine art – rudeness comes easily to the British. After all, it's what separates us from Johnny foreigner, says John Walsh

No living leader has sat on a throne as long as he has. But frail in hospital, and conspicuous by his absence during his country's crisis, is there still time for the King of Righteousness to heal the wounds of a fragile, Buddhist society?

Argentina's President Cristina Fernandez has called for David Cameron to re-open talks on the sovereignty of the Falklands.

In the second great wedge of his massive social history projected to run from 1947-79, Kynaston tells the story of Britain slowly emerging from post-war austerity. By seamlessly weaving myriad sources, he produces a gripping narrative. The six-year-old Ian Jack encouraged by his father to return the smile of the first black man he ever saw (on the Piccadilly line in 1951) leads to a chain of reminiscence on "the kindness of strangers" that includes Joe Orton's diary entries on moving into the flat of his fatal lover Kenneth Halliwell ("17 June Well! 18 June Well!! 19 June Well!!!") and Jeffrey Barnard receiving cigarettes, money and a sandwich from passers-by while being hauled across King's Cross in handcuffs after going AWOL from National Service.

Let me be clear. I'm an Atlanticist much like everyone else. I spent a happy time working in the United States. I think it is vital to our interests that we maintain a positive, strong and even uniquely warm relationship with the United States. But it is not our only relationship and it mustn't become a relationship that at every junction, every time a decision is made we have no choice but to follow the decisions made in the White House. And yet that seems to have been happening with greater velocity and frequency in recent years rather than less.