My dad's side of the family had lots of artists and musicians. There's an emotional, quite sentimental quality to Slavic culture. It's very open, it loves art, it loves music, it loves literature. It's very warm, it's very up, it's very down. I would celebrate that.

What we should be doing in the EU as a whole is more economic integration in the single market, rather than less.

The Labour Party has become consumed by collective bile towards... the Liberal Democrats. That portrays a rather nasty arrogance.

I work in lockstep, hand in glove, with the prime minister on these issues, and as we are supportive to the Eurozone so they can sort their problems out, in return they introduce safeguards to ensure precisely what I said: that the single market is not fragmented and that important industries like the financial services industry are treated fairly. Not exceptional treatment, but are just simply treated fairly, on a level playing field within Europe.

Most people in the country would think the diamond jubilee is a wonderful occasion for us to celebrate together as a community and as a nation. But I suspect that most people in the country would think, given that there is very little money around, that this probably would not be the top of their list of priorities for the use of scarce public resources.

After the economic 9/11, we will face a new world order.

What I hope is in five years' time, I can go to the British people in the election and say: Lots of you doubted that coalition politics worked, but it has worked.