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Floundering in a European mire of his own making, I fear Dave's turning into John Major

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Downing Street was forced yesterday to rush out a draft Bill, rather making a mockery of the Prime Minister's initial refusal to heed his backbenchers

Watching the Tory Party tearing itself apart over Europe in the past few days, I was struck by an uncanny sense of deja vu.

It is 20 years since John Major’s Conservative government lurched from crisis to crisis, its survival threatened by endless Eurosceptic rebellions and its hapless leader patently unable to impose his authority on his party.

David Cameron will know better than most what happened next. In 1997, standing as the Tory parliamentary candidate for Stafford, he defied his party leadership by pledging explicitly to oppose Europe’s new single currency, the euro.

Alas for the young Mr Cameron, his candidacy was swept away in the New Labour landslide, the British people recoiling from the Tories’ interminable infighting and turning to Tony Blair instead.

It was a brutal lesson in one of the essential principles of British politics.

The voters will forgive many things, but they will never stand for weak leadership and a divided party.

Curse

And now, all these years later, here we are again. The European curse has struck once more and we see a hapless Conservative Prime Minister scrambling to appease his backbench critics.

Five months ago, Mr Cameron promised a referendum on British withdrawal from the European Union — but not now.

The referendum, he insisted, must take place in 2017, two years after the next election, giving him time to negotiate a new settlement with the EU.

That was not good enough for  Mr Cameron’s backbenchers, who were infuriated by his  refusal to mention the referendum in last week’s Queen’s Speech, which listed the forthcoming Bills for the new session of parliament.

And thus, with a major rebellion looming, Downing Street was forced yesterday to rush out a draft Bill, rather making a mockery of the Prime Minister’s initial refusal to heed his backbenchers.

It is 20 years since John Major's Conservative government lurched from crisis to crisis, its survival threatened by endless Eurosceptic rebellions

Should the Bill pass, it would commit Mr Cameron to holding a nationwide referendum before December 2017, asking the blunt question: ‘Do you think the United Kingdom should remain a member of the European Union?’ Whether it will pass, however, remains doubtful. Given Lib Dem opposition, it would probably need Labour support — and Ed Miliband has shown little interest in giving the British people a say on Europe.

That’s one issue that will give Mr Cameron heart: if Miliband and Clegg lead a bloc that votes down the draft Bill later this year, the Prime Minister can say to voters he’s the only party leader who sought to give the nation a choice on the EU.

Still, the fact remains that all this was pretty embarrassing for the Prime Minister. Far from providing strong leadership, he has appeared to trail behind his backbenchers.

To the public, all this must seem a bewildering distraction from Britain’s enormous economic challenges. 

David Cameron made his major speech on Europe in January and promised a referendum on British withdrawal from the European Union - but not now. The referendum, he insisted, must take place in 2017

David Cameron is in the United States but back in Britain his party is in turmoil over Europe, despite Cameron saying he had 'learnt from the nineties' in regards to the Europe issue

At the very least, it brings back bad memories of the last Tory government, with Mr Cameron cast as the floundering John Major.

There is a bleak irony in the Prime Minister’s predicament. Seven years ago, in his first party conference as Tory leader, Mr Cameron claimed he had learned the lessons of the Nineties.

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‘While parents worried about childcare, getting the kids to school, balancing work and family life, we were banging on about Europe,’ he said.

But I rather suspect he learned the wrong lesson. Far from taking Europe too seriously, he has not taken it seriously enough.

The argument about Europe has been going on for more than half a century. At first, though, the Conservatives were the great pro-Europeans. Harold Macmillan tried (and failed) to get us into the continental club in 1963. Ted Heath took us into Europe ten years later.

And when the British people got the chance to decide for themselves with a referendum in 1975, Margaret Thatcher, that most unlikely of continental enthusiasts, campaigned wearing a jumper with the flags of Europe’s member states.

So why are the Tories still arguing about it?

The answer is obvious. Europe has changed immeasurably, evolving from a free-trade Cold War alliance into a vast semi-federal super-state.

Thanks to the introduction of the euro, states from Greece and Spain to Italy and Ireland dance to tunes written in Brussels and Berlin.

Little wonder, then, that so many Conservative backbenchers, as well as former politicians such as Lord Lawson and Michael Portillo, and Labour veterans such as Frank Field, believe ‘banging on about Europe’ has become more urgent than ever.

Indeed, whatever you think about Britain’s future in the EU, the central and unarguable fact is that this is almost certainly the most important political dilemma our generation will ever face.

And yet even when confronted with the chaos in the eurozone Mr Cameron seems not to  have grasped the seriousness  of the issue.

His referendum pledge for 2017, for example, strikes me as essentially frivolous — a purely tactical measure designed chiefly to frustrate Nigel Farage’s UKIP insurgency.

If Europe is so important that we need a referendum, it is bizarre to postpone the moment of choice for four years — by which time the German leader Angela Merkel may have taken the crucial decisions for us.

Nonsense

Mr Cameron’s claim is that this will give him the time to renegotiate the terms of our membership. I’m afraid this is complete nonsense.

Harold Wilson tried this trick in 1975 in the run-up to the national referendum, claiming he was fighting for substantially better European terms in the hope of reassuring voters that all would be well across the Channel.

In reality, the talks involved such crucial issues as ‘import levels of apricot halves’ and the ‘fixed position of rear-view mirrors on agricultural  tractors’.

Somehow I doubt  the British people will be  fooled twice.

David Cameron and Barack Obama were due to discuss the Syrian conflict and the G8 summit but the press conference was dominated by questions about Tory turmoil over Europe

In any case, by dithering and dallying in the face of his backbench critics, Mr Cameron is effectively undermining his own chances of re-election in 2015 — and thereby making it less likely the referendum will happen at all.

The Tory party released the DRAFT European Union (Referendum) Bill

The Prime Minister’s defenders insist he is the victim of intolerable pressure from a gaggle of backbench extremists. For my money, though, he got himself into this mess by making a vague, even disingenuous referendum pledge.

Now one promise follows another, each less plausible than the last.

Like John Major before him, Mr Cameron has become fundamentally reactive, always two steps behind his party, always trying to catch up, yet increasingly conscious that, whatever he offers, it will never be enough.

He looks like an inexperienced rider on a runaway horse, desperately heaving on the reins, but increasingly in danger of being thrown to the ground.

Verdict

The veteran Sir David Frost, who has interviewed plenty of world leaders in his time, put it rather well earlier this week.

Mr Cameron, he told a newspaper, ‘had the mien of a prime minister in his first year. He talked, he walked, like a prime minister. Then things got difficult . . . he no longer makes that impression’.

That sounds rather like the unfortunate John Major to me. And as Mr Cameron will recall with a shudder, the British people’s verdict in the end was not kind to him.

Even at this late stage, however, the damage is not irreparable. If David Cameron wants to silence his critics,  he should ask himself what kind of future he wants for this country. 

Like John Major before him, Mr Cameron has become fundamentally reactive, always two steps behind his party

Then he should go to Brussels and Berlin, and ask Angela Merkel and her allies precisely what they see as the future of the EU.

It does not have to be a very long conversation, just a frank one. And once Mr Cameron has his answer, he should come back to London, share his findings with the British people and invite them to decide the nation’s course.

As he himself observed, the more we bang on about Europe, the less time we devote to the other vital issues that matter so much to the British people — the economy, education and family life.

If he wants to go down as a strong and decisive leader, therefore, he should stop dithering, grasp the nettle and get on with it.







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