UNCERTAINTY is bad news for any economy. It is the most telling factor in discouraging investment.

Whether Britain has more to gain with or without the euro is the subject of some heated debate.

However, the longer we wait before making a firm commitment either way, the more long-term damage will be done to our economy.

We must decide - and decide as soon as possible - whether to embrace the euro or reject it. The current option of dithering is decreasingly viable.

At last we have from the Prime Minister a promise to end the confusion and the fudge within two years.

The Labour leadership, we are told, is in favour of joining the single currency if it is deemed in our interests to do so and only with the support of the British public in a referendum. At face value, it seems a reasonable position.

With the Conservatives, all we are promised is yet more uncertainty.

By pledging to fight to keep the pound, William Hague is giving the appearance of being anti-single currency.

But his party's official policy is not anti-euro; but only anti-euro for the lifetime of the next Parliament.

When all of British industry is eager for stability, all Mr Hague is offering is a further round of instability.

Privately, we suspect Mr Hague and many of his Shadow Cabinet colleagues may want to keep Britain outside the single currency for ever. But they dare not convert that into official party policy for fear of re-opening the deep-seated European wounds within Tory ranks, which will force out the likes of Kenneth Clarke and Michael Heseltine.

Mr Hague thinks the euro could be a vote winner for him at the General Election. He is wrong.

While Labour is blatantly buying time, waiting for a favourable environment in which to call the referendum, at least we know Mr Blair and his colleagues are offering their conditional support for the euro and promising the final say on the matter to the country at large.

By ruling out entry into the single currency for the next five years, Mr Hague is blatantly buying time to keep in place the fragile truce within his own troops.

Putting party interests before national interests will not be a vote winner