David Cameron, Prime Minister of Great Britain

Neville Cameron?

Jan 18, 2016 Mark Leonard

Prime Minister David Cameron's decision to hold a referendum on the UK’s membership in the EU could bring down his government, destroy his political party, and tear his country apart. In other words, Cameron could end up being remembered as the worst leader in British history.

LONDON – The European question is the grim reaper of British politics – dividing parties, debilitating governments, and destroying careers. But never before have the stakes surrounding the question been so high. Prime Minister David Cameron’s decision to hold a referendum – perhaps as early as June – on the United Kingdom’s continued membership in the European Union could bring down his government, destroy his political party, and literally tear his country apart.

Cameron is doing all he can to renegotiate the terms of membership in order to persuade voters to choose to remain in the EU. But referendums are notoriously unpredictable. And there is no reason to believe that the storms of populism blowing across the continent will not make landfall in the UK.

A decision to leave the EU would fall like a sledgehammer on the British economy and greatly diminish its international stature. Far worse, it could lead to the dissolution of the UK. The Scottish National Party has threatened to hold a second independence referendum if British voters decide to leave the EU. This, the SNP’s leaders argue, would allow an independent Scotland to remain part of Europe, even as England, Wales, and Northern Ireland set out on their own.

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 12 in all 12 Comments on this article

Steve Hurst Jan 23, 2016

Hilarious that the 2016 is the year when anybody questioning edicts issued by EU central is described as 'populist' despite the fact a majority in the EU are questioning just exactly what EU central is up to. The word 'populist' is in everywhere in an ongoing barf of soft and hard propaganda. It has replaced the 2015 words 'racist' or 'nazis' for anybody suggesting that the migrant influx commenced in 2015 might not be straightforward.

Quite how these EUcentrics with their superiority complex speaking down to a majority of voters in a continent think that is the answer in a democracy is beyond belief.

In fact you could comclude there where only two modes of EU central operation: complacency or panic
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jagjeet sinha Jan 20, 2016

The erstwhile USSR operated with this mentality - dogmas decided righteousness.
Western Europe was able to succeed despite Soviet Europe.
Yet Soviet Europe was convinced - their way or the highway.
EU-SSR seems to operate with the same mindset that was USSR road to nemesis.
It's earlier incarnation was the EEC - Britain had rightly chosen to join the EEC in 1973.
The EEC morphed into The EU - and Cameron rightly required revalidation from a seemingly reluctant British public.
The Brexit - should it happen - is a predicament that Greece recently faced, and Germany faces every 75 years.
A Federal Europe is perhaps the need for a section of Europe - and they must proceed towards it.
Without threatening the others who evidently prefer a more flexible Europe with multiple currencies.
Previous attempts of Federal Europe have been rather megalomaniac disasters.
The incumbent attitudes suggest no real changes despite the bloody history.
The Anglosphere was created the last time Brexit happened.
The Anglosphere perhaps better without being handicapped by Europe.
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Andrew Cole Jan 19, 2016

Well putting appeasement names or fascist descriptions to people who oppose your views, the organisation you work for, and your own personal economic interest, is easy, whereas actually justifying such assertions is more difficult. You have not tried to do so, which implies you cannot. You refer to Xenophobes and extremists across the continent, but most of the people you smear are merely reacting to what is in their view xenophobes and extremists coming in from outside their continent. Many are quite able to justify that in terms of theology - e.g. Sura Mohammed, or attitudinal data and would instead apply the same names to yourself and the leaders of the EU.
Taking one of the assertions concerning Scotland and other devolved countries within the UK. Once the EU has taken over armed forces, having already taken diplomacy, trade, and imposing the costs of the common currency on non members, that leaves the UK in possession of virtually no powers, a shell that ceases to exist. So continued membership of the centralising EU destroys the UK....not quite the same as an independent Scotland for obvious reasons.
The UK only survives with Brexit and drastic constitutional reform - a house of nations/regions for constitutional and non devolved powers, an English parliament to do the same job as Edinburgh. It is in this area and not making far more drastic EU reform demands that Cameron is failing.
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Celt Darnell Jan 19, 2016

This wouldn't be the same Mark Leonard who wrote the book "Why Europe will run the 21st Century." (2000/rev. 2005) is it?
If so, he will forgive me for taking both his analysis and prognosis with a hearty helping of salt.
As for the Johnny Foreigners in the comments gleefully predicting the end of Britain, we've been hearing that line for 300+ years now. Broken records are a bore.
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Cary Fraser Jan 19, 2016

From Enoch Powell's 'Rivers of Blood' speech of 1968:
"The supreme function of statesmanship is to provide against preventable evils. In seeking to do so, it encounters obstacles which are deeply rooted in human nature.
One is that by the very order of things such evils are not demonstrable until they have occurred: at each stage in their onset there is room for doubt and for dispute whether they be real or imaginary. By the same token, they attract little attention in comparison with current troubles, which are both indisputable and pressing: whence the besetting temptation of all politics to concern itself with the immediate present at the expense of the future."
Perhaps an insight into the politics of ambivalence that has defined the Conservative Party for several generations.
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tony maher Jan 19, 2016

An overwrought plea from one of the usual suspects. The sky will fall on our heads, the Kingdom will sunder and nameless terrors shall stalk the land.

Each of Mr. Leonard's premises are flawed (an independent Scotland at these oil prices? Replace a generous fiscal transfer from England with a bondage union in the euro? Really?) . Taken together these form a profoundly implausible scenario of disintegration and decay.

Mr. Leonard has performed the classic solipsisict error of confusing what would undoubtedly be bad for his economic well being will also be bad for everybody else's well being.

If the highest aspiration that Mr. Leonard can offer is that nothing must be permitted that would disturb the capital markets or big business then we can readily understand why the EU has become the wretched mess that it is.

Corporate welfare is not the same as economic welfare.....
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j. von Hettlingen Jan 19, 2016

There is a sense of innuendo when Mark Leonard calls Britain's prime minister "Neville Cameron". Whether a metaphor or a trope, it does not flatter David Cameron to be compared to another prime minister in Britain's history, Neville Chamberlain, whose name is still synonymous with vacillation and weakness, 76 years after he signed the Munich Agreement with Hitler. In September 1938 Britain and France accepted that the Czech region of the Sudetenland be ceded to Germany, believing that by appeasing Hitler, who made bellicose threats of military action, they had secured "peace of our time".
In March 1939 Chamberlain's hopes that this humiliating sacrifice would satisfy Hitler's major territorial demand and thus avert another catastrophic war were dashed when Nazi Germany invaded Bohemia and Moravia in the Czech region, making Slovakia a Nazi puppet state. Later in September Hitler invaded Poland, prompting Britain to declare war on Germany. Chamberlain's premiership saw an inglorious end when he resigned in May 1940, and Winston Churchill became prime minister. Churchill is said to once have quipped, "Poor Neville will come badly out of history. I know, I will write that history".
Leonard sees a parallel between Cameron and Chamberlain, because the former, as paraphrased by Churchill, "was given a choice between his party and his country, chose his party, and ended up losing both". Indeed, Cameron may even go down in history as the one who took Britain out of the European Union and being the last prime minister of the United Kingdom, should Scotland break away. In his effort to avert another war, Chamberlain chose to pacify Hitler, only to find himself in the wrong and humiliated.
The author says even though "stakes were certainly higher in Chamberlain’s case, at least his polices could be reversed before they destroyed the country". But for Cameron the ramifications would be detrimental, if he lost "both the EU and Scottish referendums". It is most unlikely that his successors would "be able to put the EU or the UK back together again." In fact he has dismissed questions about drawing up plans to resign in the event of a defeat, saying he would remain as prime minister even if he lost the referendum. He confirmed that he would follow the example of Harold Wilson, who suspended collective cabinet responsibility during the 1975 European Economic Community referendum on Britain's membership. There is also a parallel between todays in/out vote on Britain's EU membership and the 1975 referendum. The Labour party was hopelessly split, and Harold Wilson allowed cabinet members to campaign according to their consciences. Labour left-wingers played a leading role in the "No" campaign. In the end, the pro-EEC lobby prevailed, and Britain kept its membership.
Indeed, "fortunately for Cameron, he has a lot going in his favor." and there's a saying: "Better the devil you know" . No doubt "the UK’s economy, security, and international stature all benefit from EU membership. And broadly, the business community, trade unions, parliament, the media, and even a plurality of the British public all favor remaining in the EU. Meanwhile, opponents of EU membership have yet to make the case for a credible alternative." Despite challenges Brussels has been facing in recent months - "refugee crisis, terrorist attacks, and the lingering effects of the global economic crisis" The EU may still be resilient enough to forge reforms and to weather the storm.
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M M Jan 18, 2016

It shall be dealt with like the last UK General Elections and the various Referendums prior to that.........
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hari naidu Jan 18, 2016

Cameron is a Eton - boy's school - product. What do you expect from his type? The referendum will go against EU membership - spelling the end of Union Jack! Has he really considered that political reality or not?

http://www.etoncollege.com/
- hari naidu Jan 20, 2016
  
  @ Crocket
  The nonsense you're peddling here is, in fact, Eaton was always for the kids of aristocrats...Brexit will break-open the Union Jack. Do you understand what that means in realpolitik?
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- michael CROCKETT Jan 19, 2016
  
  Those who know anything about it say that the best Etonians are the very best people, and the worst are the very worst. The fact that Cameron was well educated does not mean he is therefore a bad PM. You, sir, are writing complete drivel.
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Shane Beck Jan 18, 2016

It all depends- if the events in Calais in June 2015 (where asylum seekers disrupted train and road traffic across the Channel) or New Years Eve 2015 in Cologne (where hundreds of women were sexually assaulted) were to occur close to the referendum, I have no doubt that Cameron would have problems keeping the UK in the EU.....
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