27 Oct 2009

Cameron wouldn’t start from Blair on EU president, but where will he end?

I wouldn’t start from here.

That was David Cameron’s first line of defence over the EU president position at his press conference just finished.

His second line: I really don’t want Tony Blair.

He’d be high profile, big impact (“Too good at the job?” Sky’s Adam Boulton asked), so, bizarrely perhaps, the Tory position is that they would, by default, support the sort of compromise, low-impact, low-profile, Europhile Benelux candidate that often ends up winning top European jobs and who Tories normally try to keep out.

David Cameron would not repeat William Hague’s line delivered in private to ambassadors that a Blair appointment would be considered a hostile act by Europe, with all the menace that come with that, but said he supported every word his shadow foreign secretary had said.

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– Related:
Wilshire allows Cameron to show he really ‘gets it’
Is there a Tory ‘plan B’ for Europe?

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