LONDON VAUXHALL DEALERS

LONDON - Prime Minister Stephen Harper presented Queen Elizabeth with her Diamond Jubilee gift Wednesday morning at Buckingham Palace, a giant portrait of Her Majesty painted by Canadian artist Phil Richards.

Harper's private audience with the Queen was the last of the prime minister's events connected to the Diamond Jubilee. For three days here, he's attended concerts, pageants, parades, and a service of thanksgiving in historic St. Paul's Cathedral.

Harper now turns his attention to matters of state and the global economy.

On Wednesday afternoon, he'll hold a closed-door meeting with some British business leaders and then head to Paris where, on Thursday morning, he'll have a meeting with French President Francois Hollande at the Elysee Palace.

Those meetings are bound to be dominated by the worsening fiscal crisis in Europe.

Spain's Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said his country in a situation of "extreme difficulty" while his budget minister, Cristobal Montoro, said his government's fiscal situation is so dire that it "does not have the door to the markets open."

In other words, the world's banks now think Spain is about to turn into Greece.

Harper, in an interview with the Financial Times, clearly showed his frustration with the failure of European leaders to get their fiscal house in order.

"We're four years into the crisis and we're still trying to get a sense of what the game plan is," Harper told the paper. "We need measures that are going to be decisive."