Rachel Sylvester in the Times says that Tory frontbenchers and senior civil servants, including Sir Gus O'Donnell, were impressed by a recent briefing about the way the Canadians brought debt down by cutting spending by up to 20%.
What was perhaps more interesting was that the civil servants, including Sir Gus, were in broad agreement that there were lessons for Britain from Canada. The consensus was that even a 10% cut in spending – the figure used by Labour to attack the Conservatives – may not be enough.
Steve Richards in the Independent says he's impressed by David Cameron's analysis of when quangos are necessary and when they're not.
A lot of the cock-ups in recent decades have been the responsibility of well-paid members of quangos who are not held to account by voters or by the media. Our media culture somehow cannot cope with the idea of challenging figures who are, in some cases, more powerful than puny elected ministers held to account around the clock.
But Will Straw at LabourList says that Cameron's quango speech was a "discordant harmony".
One note was aimed at a populist "slash and burn" audience and outlined the £64bn cost of Britain's 790 to 1,100 quangos. The other was aimed at a more elite, "Sir Humphrey" audience and outlined that there were principles behind his approach. The problem is that the principles are so woolly and vague that they are unlikely to result in any cost savings at all.
Philip Stephen in the Financial Times says the people do not know what the Conservatives stand for.
Amid the barrage of pronouncements, a central question goes unanswered: what is a Tory government for? Whitehall officials tell me they are none the wiser for their private discussions with Mr Cameron's team.
The BBC reports that Jeffrey Donaldson, the DUP MP, has repaid more than £660 to the Commons to cover the cost of pay-per-view films on his hotel bills. But he says he was not watching adult movies.
The films that I watched on pay TV would have been films that you would have seen in the cinema. Unfortunately, because of my security situation at the time, my family and I can't go to the cinema, so I took the opportunity to watch some of the films at the hotel.
