David
Cameron, the accidental European
How
Britain’s most Euroskeptic prime minister since Margaret Thatcher
came to campaign for the U.K. to remain in the EU.
By TOM MCTAGUE
5/20/16, 5:31 AM CET
LONDON — David
Cameron promised to end his party’s obsession with Europe. Instead
his premiership will be defined by it.
The British prime
minister is all but certain to suffer his own ignominious departure
if Britain votes to exit the European Union. To Cameron’s critics
it would be a fitting end to a political career laced with
opportunistic Brussels bashing — the ultimate comeuppance for years
of pandering to Tory prejudice.
“You can’t spend
years and years and years trashing the European Union in order to
curry favor and expect people to all along understand that you didn’t
really mean it,” one senior member of the previous Tory-led
coalition government told POLITICO.
Those who have
worked with Cameron reject any notion of a “Damascene conversion”
on Europe. Despite his instinctive Euroskepticism and passionate
opposition to the euro, he has never supported withdrawal.
“What people
always forget is how preoccupied he is with being seen as a
successful leader of his party” — a former cabinet minister
For those who know
him well, his decision to risk the wrath of his party to campaign
wholeheartedly for Remain is the combination of cold self-interest in
winning and deeply held conservatism which favors the concrete
benefits of the status quo. Above all, his drive to stay in the EU is
the result of a ferocious determination to restore Tory dominance in
Westminster.
“He’s absolutely
fixated on going down in history as the Conservative Party leader who
returned the Conservative Party back to good sense and power,” said
the senior minister in the previous coalition government, speaking on
condition of anonymity.
A party split caused
by Brexit is the major threat to Conservative Party hegemony that he
hopes to make his legacy.
Tory pragmatist
Unlike Tony Blair,
Cameron did not choose his party — he was born into it. “The one
bit of his conviction you can never underestimate is the unbelievably
strongly held view that chaps like him should be in charge,” the
former cabinet minister said.
“What people
always forget is how preoccupied he is with being seen as a
successful leader of his party,” said the source. “He remains a
Conservative Party leader first and a good prime minister second.”
Cameron does not
want his premiership defined by Europe, but by late 2012 he
calculated that a referendum was unavoidable and the Tories needed to
finally put the issue to bed to get back to the task of crushing
Labour in 2020.
Once the decision
was made the only pragmatic option was to back Remain — primarily
because the risks of leaving are too great and he calculated the
country would never vote for it.
Long-term Cameron
ally Michael Gove, the justice secretary who is campaigning for
Brexit, has described him as “the kind of poker player who waits
and reads the other players and bets when he knows the alignment is
in his favor.”
It is the kind of
description which crops up again and again. One veteran Conservative
MP who knows the prime minister well said: “He’s a pragmatist —
his prejudices are Euroskeptic, but he has to think about what is
best for the government and the party for being reelected.”
The Tory MP said
Cameron had simply taken the view that Remain would win. “It’s
not that he believes it. He comes to a view on what is best and then
starts to believe what he is saying. He used to share my prejudice
for liberalizing drugs but he dropped that on becoming PM.”
Euroskeptic roots
In October 2011,
Cameron and the then Foreign Secretary William Hague led the charge
against holding an In/Out referendum, arguing that it was not in
Britain’s interest and would weaken its bargaining power.
Just 15 months
later, in January 2013, he had performed a complete volte face.
Cameron certainly
started out as a Euroskeptic.
Former Downing
Street foreign policy adviser Sir Stephen Wall, who got to know
Cameron in the early 1990s when they briefed John Major, told
POLITICO that at the time the future prime minister was “one of
those for whom loyalty to the former leader [Margaret Thatcher] was
synonymous with being anti-European.”
Wall added: “There
is a story [former Labour MP and ex-Europe Minister] Denis MacShane
tells where he bumped into Cameron in the locker room in the House of
Commons gym. Denis offers to give some advice on how to ‘handle’
Europe, but Cameron says: ‘Denis, you don’t seem to realize that
I am a skeptic. That is my view.’”
Cameron, whose
father read the fiercely anti-EU tabloid the Daily Express, joined
the Conservative Party as a researcher at the height of Thatcher’s
power and certainly showed no early sign of demurring from her
antagonism to Brussels.
His Euroskeptic
credentials were further honed as the special adviser to former
Chancellor Norman Lamont — now an enthusiastic Brexit supporter —
in the 1990s.
As an MP, Cameron
said his “passionate” opposition to the euro was formed during
the “humiliating experience” of watching Britain being kicked out
of the exchange rate mechanism, the forerunner to the euro, under
Lamont’s stewardship.
Later, as a
backbench MP Cameron described himself as a “genuine skeptic” and
railed against the “monstrous” EU directive from Brussels
introducing the European arrest warrant — which he now supports.
As party leader,
Cameron pulled Conservative MEPs out of the European Parliament’s
center-right European People’s Party because, he claimed, it was
too federalist.
Yet, despite all of
this, and much to his frustration, Cameron’s Euroskepticism has
often been questioned.
Despite his
pragmatism, those who know him insist Cameron’s stance has shifted
subtly — but nevertheless genuinely — in favor of the EU during
his time as prime minister.
When applying to be
the Conservative candidate for Witney, the safe seat in Oxfordshire
which he won in 2001, he was originally put down as a question mark
on an internal party list of Euroskeptics.
Cameron challenged
the ruling — eventually getting it overturned — declaring: “These
are my views: no to the single currency, no to further transfer of
powers from Westminster to Brussels and yes to renegotiation of areas
like fish where the EU has been a disaster for the U.K. If that is
being a Europhile, then I’m a banana.”
However, Cameron
also admitted then that he was not an outer: “The answer is no.”
Learning to love
Europe
Despite his
pragmatism, those who know him insist Cameron’s stance has shifted
subtly — but nevertheless genuinely — in favor of the EU during
his time as prime minister.
“I certainty
noticed when I was sat around the cabinet table that at the beginning
he had quite cardboard cut-out, cheap gags about how ghastly the
European Union was and how tedious the European summits were,” the
former senior coalition minister said.
The PM began to drop
this act after two diplomatic setbacks in his first term.
“He was very put
out by the time when [German Chancellor Angela] Merkel and [French
President François] Hollande went to Ukraine for a summit with Putin
on their own and didn’t inform him. I think that was quite
important,” the source said.
What he discovered
in that process is when he puts his mind to it he’s a bloody good
negotiator on behalf of the U.K. in these summits” — former
coalition figure
The prime minister
was also bruised by the 2011 debacle when he opposed a proposed
fiscal compact but was ignored anyway, figures close to the
negotiation said.
Number 10 rejects
this portrayal of events but admits Cameron’s position has hardened
in favor of EU membership as a result of his sobering experience as a
PM who has found the hard way that he needs to work with Brussels.
A senior Downing
Street source said: “He would say sanctions against Russia from the
whole of the EU only exist because of the U.K. This is something we
wanted to do as a country but our force was magnified and amplified
by being part of the EU.”
The prime minister
privately points to the migration crisis as a moment that helped
shape his thoughts in Europe.
The Downing Street
source said: “On migration we had an opt out so we were not in a
situation where we have to take people. But he went to the European
Council and had a seat at the table.
“He was there at
2:30 a.m. helping them come up with a deal to make sure that
migration was properly handled and dealt with because that was a
massive influence on the U.K.,” said the source. “He thought that
that was a particularly strong example of how you can actually make a
difference by just being there.”
Michael Howard,
former leader of the Tory party and Cameron's mentor | Alan
Crowhurst/Getty Images
Michael Howard,
former leader of the Tory party and Cameron’s mentor | Alan
Crowhurst/Getty Images
After the early
bruising encounters in Europe, Cameron’s coalition colleagues felt
that he had learned to play the Brussels game and even developed a
“slight proprietorial affection” for the EU leaders’ club.
The former coalition
figure said: “He’s an incredibly quick learner, a very versatile
politician. If he bumps up against an obstacle he will think hard
about how to maneuver himself around it more successfully next time
and that’s what he did. What he discovered in that process is when
he puts his mind to it he’s a bloody good negotiator on behalf of
the U.K. in these summits.”
Cameron has also
been left in no doubt about Washington’s view. “I was told by
very, very, very senior members of the U.S. administration they just
simply don’t get at all why on earth he is even risking Britain
leaving the European Union,” said the source.
The answer, for
Cameron, is that he had no choice. It was the pragmatic decision to
make.
Demolishing Labour
A series of columns
for the left-wing Guardian newspaper between 2001 and 2005 when
Cameron was an aspiring MP and backbencher give the clearest outline
of his broader political philosophy, most notably an instinctive
conservatism and a determination to win.
In January 2005,
less than a year before becoming Tory leader, Cameron wrote that the
principle of his thinking was that “concrete benefits of an
existing society must be taken more seriously than potential,
abstract benefits” of some other system.
This is the Cameron
plan: Get the referendum out of the way and then concentrate on
burying Labour.
The burden of proof,
he said, should “always lie on those proposing change.” This now
forms the centerpiece of his campaign against Brexit whenever he is
asked what would happen if the U.K. did pull out of the EU.
If Tories are to win
elections, Cameron wrote, they need “a relentless focus on the
things that people care about in their daily lives.” And to
Cameron, crucially, Europe is not one of these things.
His underlying
reading of British politics has remained remarkably constant. He
still believes the Tories need to fight the 2020 election on issues
that really preoccupy the public and is planning a blitz of
announcements designed to plant the party firmly in the center ground
after the referendum.
This is the Cameron
plan: Get the referendum out of the way and then concentrate on
burying Labour.
To some, this
relentless focus on winning marks him out as untrustworthy.
The only time
Cameron has shown real conviction on an issue other than the euro is
on the hunting ban, which he admitted getting “really angry”
about and “losing it” with Labour MPs.
But even on this he
has yet to reverse the legislation in the Commons, or even try to,
because the majority of MPs favor the ban.
Last roll of the
dice
Although he has
pledged to carry on as prime minister in the event of a vote to
leave, many Conservative MPs privately insist Cameron cannot credibly
hope to negotiate a new deal with the EU.
Cameron’s former
mentor Michael Howard, a former Tory leader, said Tuesday that
Cameron could stay on in Number 10 but would have to nominate an
outer to lead the talks if he lost the June 23 poll in a bid to unify
the party.
By contrast, if
Cameron can secure a comfortable win, he is expected to quickly carry
out a “unity reshuffle” of his cabinet.
Such an arrangement
would leave him prime minister in name only, staying in position to
calm the markets before the Tories elected a new leader once the
initial turmoil had calmed.
One Conservative
minister, a passionate supporter of EU membership, said Cameron would
struggle to stay on after a vote to leave: “It would be tough. When
you’re identified to such an extent with one side, to turn around
and say ‘forget all that stuff.’”
By contrast, if
Cameron can secure a comfortable win, he is expected to quickly carry
out a “unity reshuffle” of his cabinet, with top jobs for Brexit
supporters deemed to have behaved reasonably in the campaign.
The prime minister’s
journey from ambitious Euroskeptic to passionate EU defender is far
shorter than at first sight.
He has never wanted
Britain to leave the EU and would rather not be having the
discussion.
But now that he is,
he knows what he needs to do — for his own sake and in his view,
that of his party
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