I never thought I would see the day I would be defending Edward McMillan-Scott, however, the day has arrived. Although standing against your party for an elected office normally deserves an automatic expulsion from your party - and any political party would do that - these are not normal circumstances.
The EPP does not represent my interests in the European Parliament. I want Britain to have an agreement with the EU in the same way Switzerland has. The EPP does not want that and neither does Mr McMillan-Scott. The Conservative Party was right to try and create a new group in the European Parliament. I have not disagreed with David Cameron on that point. But what have we got? The Conservative Party is now in coalition with some of the biggest loony tunes in European politics. Surely Cameron could see this coming? He should have stuck with the EPP and stated a new coalition could not be created.
As a Eurosceptic, I would not want to be in this new group if I was a Conservative MEP. Despite his Europhile views, Edward McMillan-Scott has served the Conservative Party for many years, although I wonder how any Conservative can hold his views on Europe. On a PR front, this is bad for Cameron, and during PMQs tomorrow, Brown should be able to score in to an open goal. Cameron has displayed a lack of judgment in this enterprise. He should have allowed McMillan-Scott to be the official candidate for Vice-President and gone from there. The last thing he needed was this debacle. It is a mess of his own making.
2 comments:
What is most absurd is that a perfectly workable compromise arrangement had existed since 1999 - the Conservatives sat in the "European Democrats" subgroup in a formal coalition with the European People's Party. This arrangement allowed the centre right to accommodate the differences between Europhile Christian Democracy and Eurosceptic Conservatism.
Sure the ED could have functioned better, but it would have been helped if certain MEPs had taken a constructive approach to the set-up instead of trying to undermine it at every turn. Instead the grassroots were whipped up by do-nothing scorched earthers.
Andrew, have I not been down on Cameron from the very beginning? This does not mean I'm anti-Tory, quite the opposite.
It's time now to put either Hannan or one of the MPs in before it's too late.
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