« Voters distrust Romney over his personal taxes: you read it here first | Main | Long spoon time for Tory eurosceptics: guess who's coming to dinner? »
31 January 2012 4:59 PM
Cameron's climb-down: as I said in December, 'Dave's an EU pansy'
Tory MPs are accusing the Prime Minister of back-tracking after he agreed last night to the new European treaty he rejected just last month.
Reports tell us there is 'anger,' 'fury,' and a 'backlash' is coming from the backbenches.
Why? David Cameron only did exactly what anyone who has been watching him on Europe -- and that would be, er, me, but apparently no one on the Conservative backbenches -- knew he would do.
In the week before the December European summit, Cameron had written an article in the Times full of tough-guy talk directed at other European politicians. Example, one line: 'Our requirements will be practical and focused, but eurozone countries should not mistake this for any lack of steel.'
To which I replied: 'Memo to tough-talking Dave: trouble is, Brussels knows you're a pansy.'
I noted that 'I've been talking to a diplomat who assures me (as long as I don't quote him) that "the British are being much more conciliatory behind closed doors." I just bet they are.'
Which is why I can't figure out why the Tory MPs are acting surprised and 'angry.' Cameron is just doing what Cameron always does: he finds a way to wriggle around and capitulate to the EU and Nick Clegg -- because at heart he is no eurosceptic, and indeed at heart Cameron is no Conservative.
After the summit, at which Cameron's spin was that he 'vetoed' the new treaty, his backbenchers went into ecstasies, thinking their brave leader had defied the EU.
Not me. I wrote that 'Cameron is not as brave as he looks.'
'I'll ask you to note this before you decide he was brave in using the veto: by refusing to sign the plan for a new treaty Merkozy were demanding, Cameron got exactly what he needed at the summit.'
'He needed a way to arrive back home and say that Britain doesn't now need to have a referendum.'
'Which is exactly what he got in Brussels, an escape from a popular vote. By refusing to agree to the new eurzone "fiscal pact" treaty, he is -- for the moment -- safe from a referendum. Cameron's "courage" was Cameron dodging a bullet. Which is to say, a quick maoeuvre to his own political benefit.'
That was December. What happened last night in Brussels was that Cameron merely reverted to form -- his form being, a politician as much wedded to the European project as is Nick Clegg.
The only question is why so many Tory MPs were fooled in December into imagining he was anything else.
January 31, 2012 | Permalink | Comments (4)
Share this article:
Comments
Feed[i-Feed] You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.
All true Mary and awfully sick making . The Tory europlastics are not fit for purpose just like the rest of the MPs in the treacherous House of Fools LibLabCon out .
Posted by: ADAMS | 01/02/2012 at 09:29 AM
Ms Synon, thank you for continuing to point out what is clear to all those who bother to think it through, that is, Mr. Cameron is a europhile and, ipso facto, not a Conservative. I hope that your message will eventually get home and people wake up to the fact that we are being sold out by our own politicians. In the mean time keep up the excellent work.
Posted by: Paul Coombes | 31/01/2012 at 11:06 PM
Greetings from Cork. Glad to see the blue flag still flying from Brussels. Cant imagine why ytou moved to the worst bureacracy in the world!!! And of course you're absolutely right about David Cameron.
Posted by: Brendan Ryan | 31/01/2012 at 09:09 PM
Euroseptic blog
MARY ELLEN SYNON
Mary Ellen Synon is based in Brussels as a columnist at the Irish Daily Mail and contributor to the Mail on Sunday.
At other times she has worked as: a columnist at the Irish Sunday Independent and the Sunday Business Post, Ireland correspondent and later Europe correspondent at the Economist, an associate producer at CBS News 60 Minutes based in London, and a reporter for the Daily Telegraph.
Early in her career she was awarded a travelling fellowship by the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust to allow her to study the Common Market.
Recent Posts
- Ireland and the EU: the groupie at the rock star's hotel room
- The new EU: are you German or non-German?
- Really, for his own good: a German solution for a French sex pest?
- Un-European: Irish butcher chopped by anti-goose liver campaigners
- When the Greeks default, the first thing you do is book that holiday
- Beijing to Berlin: 'Do we look stupid?'
- Economic vivisection: what the Germans are doing to the Greeks
- Germany's nasty little game to push the Greeks until they break
- The Greeks: say yes today, get cash tomorrow, find obstacle next day
- 'Freedom!' -- No euro for an independent Scotland
Archives
- February 2012
- January 2012
- December 2011
- November 2011
- October 2011
- September 2011
- August 2011
- July 2011
- June 2011
- May 2011
- April 2011
- March 2011
- February 2011
- January 2011
- December 2010
- November 2010
- October 2010
- September 2010
- August 2010
- July 2010
- June 2010
- May 2010
- April 2010
- March 2010
- February 2010
- January 2010
- December 2009
- November 2009
- October 2009
- September 2009
- August 2009
- July 2009
- June 2009
- May 2009
- April 2009
- March 2009
- February 2009
- January 2009
- December 2008
Links
- Open Europe
- Brussels Journal
- Bruges Group
- Daniel Hannan MEP
- The European Voice
- EU Referendum
- Chronicles Magazine
- Taki's Magazine
- Financial Times Brussels blog
- EU Online (portal of all EU Institutions)
- The Economist Charlemagne column
- Institute of Economic Affairs
- Centre for European Reform
- Boulton & Co
- Comment Central
- Conservative Home
- Guido Fawkes
- HM Treasury
- Iain Dale
- Nick Robinson's Newslog
- Parliament Live TV
- Parliament
- Paul Waugh
- Play Political
- Political Betting
- Politics Home
- Adam Smith
- Red Box
- Register of Members' Interests
- Revolts
- Stephen Pollard
- The Spectator's Coffee House
- Three Line Whip
- UK Polling Report
- 10 Downing Street
- The Daily Mail is not responsible for the content of external sites
Reply to Brendan Ryan. Good grief, I wasn't expecting to hear from you. (For the benefit of British readers, Mr Ryan is a left-wing Irish politician and former member of the Irish Senate. He is also a Cork man, so I forgive him much of that.) Brendan, I have not 'moved to the worst bureaucracy in the world.' I have been dropped behind enemy lines. Still, I am delighted to see that you are reading my blog. Welcome to the discussion.
Posted by: Mary Ellen Synon | 01/02/2012 at 10:56 AM