Tag Archives: EU referendum

‘Simply unstoppable or a self-inflicted wound?’, UK in a Changing Europe, 21 June 2016.

Posted on August 4, 2016 by

Today, we heard the Prime Minister give his final plea on why we should remain in the European Union, but if David Cameron ever truly believed he could stop his party ‘banging on about Europe’ when it finally got back … Continue reading →

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‘The Corn Laws analogy is misplaced. There’s no good reason why the Tories should split over Europe’, ConservativeHome, 17 May 2016.

Posted on May 22, 2016 by

An apocryphal aphorism coined by a firebrand left-wing legend might not be an obvious way to start a discussion about what could happen to the Conservative Party in the wake of the EU Referendum, but Nye Bevan surely had a … Continue reading →

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‘David Cameron is not the man to shoot the Conservative Eurosceptic dog’, Telegraph, 10 May 2016

Posted on May 22, 2016 by

You know the Tory Civil War is back on when the body-snatching starts again in earnest.  A few weeks ago, Winston Churchill’s grandson, Sir Nicholas Soames, the MP for Mid-Sussex, made it plain that he took a dim view of … Continue reading →

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‘Why Iain Duncan Smith resignation registers a six on the political Richter Scale’, The Conversation, 20 March 2016.

Posted on April 16, 2016 by

If there were a Richter Scale of Political Resignations, then prime ministers such as Margaret Thatcher, Harold Wilson and Harold Macmillan would register at the very top – on nine. Big beasts such as Conservative Chancellor Geoffrey Howe and Defence … Continue reading →

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‘The bloody history of civil war in the Tory party’, Financial Times, 27 February 2016

Posted on March 6, 2016 by

That the Conservative party believes as much in the strong state as it does in the free economy has long been both its triumph and its tragedy. Triumph because the combination of the two has often proved electorally unbeatable. Think … Continue reading →

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‘Speaking for Britain? MPs broadly reflect the views of their supporters on Europe – but one side should worry a little more than the other’ (with Philip Cowley, Anand Menon and Sofia Vasilopoulou LSE Brexit Blog, 12 February, 2016.

Posted on February 21, 2016 by

To hear some people talk about ‘the political class’, you’d think that those who do the electing and those that get elected have little in common, creating a damaging disconnect which is supposedly fuelling populist politics on both left and … Continue reading →

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‘Cameron and Tebbit are both wrong: Tory activists are not as set on leaving the EU as many imagine’ (with Monica Poletti and Paul Webb), 5 February 2016.

Posted on February 21, 2016 by

David Cameron has run into trouble for warning Tory backbenchers not to make up their minds on whether to campaign for Leave or Remain “because of what your constituency association might say”. The reaction to his remarks was swift and … Continue reading →

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