Donald Macintyre's Sketch: A wafer-thin majority - so don't mention the war with the Eurosceptics Is David Cameron getting more satirical? Asked about the abandoned "visa bond" for foreign visitors, the Prime Minister told the CBI this had been Nick Clegg's idea, adding patronisingly to appreciative titters: "He has lots of good ideas, but this one is not one we are going ahead with." This so captured the tone of Headmaster Cameron in Private Eye's "New Coalition Academy," that he must be a secret fan. Yesterday, however, he laid claim to a "deeply progressive" agenda. Since Blairite types used this word to indicate a vaguely left of centre outlook, he clearly felt the need to distance himself from his own headbangers. Especially on the EU, which the CBI is in favour of. Cameron avoided it in his set speech but was then asked about it by a woman who wondered how he would ensure a "positive" debate "rather than just headlines from the Daily Mail." His planned referendum, he insisted, wasn't a "short term tactical ploy" but a cunning wheeze - as he didn't put it - to overcome the "wafer-thin" majority for Britain's membership of an unreformed Europe. Cameron, who stressed the need for better skills teaching, touted government-backed "Catapult Centres." Was this somewhere pupils can perfect their hand-eye co-ordination by deploying the weapons of choice for 1950s child anti-heroes such as William and Dennis the Menace? No, they're where brilliant hi-tech ideas become "commercial realities." And Ed Balls, to demonstrate his desire for "consensus" - the shadow Chancellor outdid Cameron by using the term nine times - said that the next Labour government would support them too, having started them in the first place. Balls wanted "a long term partnership" between government and business, saying: "As... Lord Mandelson concluded: "Ministers and markets can and should mix..."" In ancient times - a decade ago - Balls and Mandelson were deadly enemies. Since their historic rapprochement, however, Balls is about the only shadow Cabinet member who dares to mention Mandelson approvingly in public. After Cameron's put down, we were thrilled that the next speaker would be the Deputy Prime Minister. Except that it was Poland's, Jacek Rostowski. Like Clegg, he went to Westminster School. Which doesn't quite explain why he spoke in more elegant and faultless English than you ever hear from a British politician.