Britain: 'Eccentrics' could hold Cameron govt to ransom

A David Cameron government would face being held to ransom by a series of "eccentrics" at home and abroad, experts warn.

The Conservative leader's precarious position - without his own majority in Parliament - would leave his administration vulnerable to the demands of "slightly potty" MPs with unconventional views on issues ranging from climate change to gay rights and immigration.

Whips have been put on notice that a series of veteran Tory MPs, plus several from the new intake, are liable to rebel in Parliament if the leadership does not take their views into account. The electoral arithmetic, even if the Liberal Democrats agree to prop up a Tory administration, means that the potential impact of any rebels could be catastrophic if Mr Cameron faces knife-edge votes in the coming months.

"I suspect the new intake won't really reveal its true nature until it's become clear who is and isn't on the promotion track," said Tim Bale, author of The Conservative Party from Thatcher to Cameron.

"Cameron's real problem will come if he can't deliver on his Euro-promises, in which case the usual suspects, plus the only-slightly-potty penumbra, will be up in arms."

The heightened threat to stability posed by potential Tory rebels could be reinforced by Mr Cameron's problems in Europe, where he faces the prospect of being isolated from the key powers in the EU. Mr Cameron was condemned several months ago, when he withdrew his MEPs from the centre-right EPP grouping in the European Parliament n home to Germany's and France's ruling parties n to set up the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) with smaller political groups.

Several other members of the ECR, from countries such as Poland, Latvia and Lithuania, have been accused of displaying a range of right-wing attitudes, including homophobia and anti-Semitism.

Tory officials insist relations with European leaders remain cordial, although Germany's Chancellor, Angela Merkel, and the French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, are understood to harbour concerns at the party's Euroscepsticism. They fear Mr Cameron will seek opt-outs from swathes of social and employment policy and from chunks of justice and home affairs legislation.

Mr Cameron might share the same table at the official sessions of the summit. But beyond the conference room, where the serious business is done, over private dinners and quiet one-to-one meetings, he may have to settle for face-time with like-minded friends from the smaller countries.

Edward McMillan-Scott, a former leader of the Tory MEPs who defected to the Liberal Democrats after protesting about the make-up of the ECR, said: "Cameron's mistake was not only to associate with extremists, but also to rely on fragmentary and unstable east/central European allies. The association with the Tories gave respectability to parties like Poland's Law and Justice." Britain's chances of remaining at the heart of Europe could be under threat from a party which has managed to isolate itself even before getting into government.

The disproportionate influence of elements outside the mainstream is not only an issue for the Conservatives in Europe.

While none of them are quite as objectionable as the Tories' European associates, the party has its own collection of voluble right-wingers, Eurosceptics, backwoodsmen and climate-change deniers. They peel off regularly from mainstream party opinion to express their views and voice their dissent. But they have usually made little impact, until now.

Such mavericks have, by and large, been tolerated - indulged, even - by Tory leaders who have seen them as no threat to party stability. But after a general election that has given every seat significance far in excess of its mathematical value, Mr Cameron's eccentrics and rebels can no longer be ignored.

A month ago, a leading right-wing commentator warned that at least 20 discontented MPs were preparing "to act against" Mr Cameron - and his Shadow Chancellor and campaign coordinator, George Osborne - if the Tory leader failed to win the general election.

"Already the 92 Group, a club of Thatcherite MPs, is planning a meeting in the week after the election that could demand Osborne's head," the journalist Benedict Brogan observed in his Telegraph blog. "A coalition of the excluded, the irreconcilables and those nursing grievances over the handling of the expenses inquiry is preparing to break its silence. Up to 20 MPs are said to be ready to speak out."

Mr Cameron may yet confound his detractors and become prime minister, by persuading other parties to help install him in Downing Street - but still he will not escape criticism from within. In a climate where every parliamentary vote, even the future of his Government, could depend on keeping his MPs happy - or at least quiet - the Conservative leader and his whips will have to work hard to keep a lid on discontent. He might find himself making unpalatable accommodations with some of the least attractive elements of his own party n and other parties in his coalition n to keep his government alive.

Dr Bale, who lectures in politics at Sussex University, added: "The most obvious of the usual suspects is Edward Leigh, if he doesn't get thrown a bone that befits his presumed importance."

Mr Leigh, a veteran Thatcherite, is a member of the 92 Group and president of another right-wing organisation, the socially conservative Cornerstone Group, which includes some 40 Conservative MPs. During the early months of Mr Cameron's leadership he accused the new regime of "turning down the volume" on the party's core beliefs to the point that they were "inaudible".

He complained that the party appeared to have been "terrified into silence" on fundamental reform of schools and hospitals, where it had now accepted the dominant New Labour orthodoxy.

But it is the Euroscepticism of a man who was sacked from John Major's government in 1993 over his opposition to the Maastricht Treaty which raises most concerns among the party hierarchy. Mr Leigh is among a core of Eurosceptics on the Tory benches, which includes veterans such as Bill Cash and younger MPs such as Douglas Carswell. Many were simply angered by Mr Cameron's decision to abandon the party's pledge to hold a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty; some want a reordering of the UK's relationship with the EU.

Mr Cameron is keenly aware of the damage internal rows over Europe can do to his party. But he must also keep control over colleagues with unconventional views on a range of issues, such as abortion, the death penalty and gay rights.

Professor Philip Cowley, an expert in back-bench voting behaviour, has found Conservative MPs in opposition were less rebellious than their counterparts on the government benches. But he added: "When it comes to backbench rebellion, past behaviour is a usually an excellent predictor of future action. Philip Davies [MP for Shipley], who was the most rebellious of the 2005 intake, remarked: 'David [Cameron] is relaxed about us having different views on certain issues.' Such a relaxed attitude may not last long in government.

"None of this is to assume that there will be much trouble early on. A common pattern in post-war governments is to see relatively little trouble in the early days."

Professor Cowley's study of Conservative rebelliousness pointed out that the first parliamentary session under a new government is usually the least rebellious. He said: "David Cameron and his whips can therefore be guaranteed a post-victory honeymoon. Discontent can, however, surface soon afterwards. There may be a honeymoon, but there is no guarantee that it will last very long."

- INDEPENDENT