The Conservatives are still the nasty party in Europe

Cameron's empty claim that his Tory party are the real defenders of social justice and equality rings particularly hollow in Europe.

In 2004, the Commission promised to draft a proposal for a "horizontal" directive under Article 13 of the Treaty to combat discrimination in access to goods amd services in the European market on the grounds of sex, race, religion, disability, age or sexual orientation. At present, only discrimination on the grounds of gender, race or ethnicity is covered by existing directives and Parliament’s report called for Commission to "complete the package of anti-discrimination legislation". Such legislation would prohibit both direct and indirect discrimination in all areas that fall under EU competence. Yesterday, the Tory MEPs (with the honourable exceptions of Christopher Beazley and John Bowis) voted against a report by Liberal Democrat Liz Lynne which called for such legislation.

That the Conservatives would effectively vote for a hierarchy of discrimination shows that whilst they may talk the language of social justice and compassion actually doing something about it is a completely different matter.

It is the same in other areas too. The vast majority of the Conservatives (who have just one female MEP don't forget) have consistently voted against women's rights and aside from Caroline Jackson, didn't even support a measure to combat domestic violence.

Cameron of course kickstarted his cuddly image by going green yet Roger Helmer, their representative on the climate change committee, continues to denounce any attempts to battle climate change.

Worse still if you ever glance at "Conservative Home" or other Tory blogs, a lot of the MEPs are citicised for not being right wing enough!