26/05/2012
All political parties require their myths. It is these which sustain them, give them their identity and which provide a rallying point for their members.
Today, we see one of the core myths sustaining the grouping currently masquerading as the Conservative Party, gloriously articulated by Bruce Anderson in
Conservative Home.
Responding to the calls for an EU referendum, Anderson has this to offer:
⦠there is only one sensible response: to move forward with care and to trust the leadership. Since 1975, although mistakes have been made, the Tory Party has been the Eurosceptics' principal asset and the federasts' main obstacle. ⦠the Tory Party is the Euro-fanatics' main adversary.
Never mind that the ground for our entry to the EEC was paved by Conservative prime minister Harold Macmillan. Forget completely that we joined the EEC under the aegis of another Conservative prime minister, Ted Heath.
Then ignore the fact that the core treaty establish the European Union was agreed by Conservative prime minister Margaret Thatcher (part 1 â the Single European Act) â who also led the "yes" campaign for the Tories in the '75 referendum - and Conservative prime minister John Major (part 2 â Maastricht).
And one must also skirt round the fact that the writ of the Lisbon Treaty (aka European Constitution) holds only because a current quasi-prime minister, David Cameron, allowed it - a man with a
long history of euro-compliance.
Of course, says Anderson, "mistakes have been made". But the greatest mistake of all would be to trust the Tory leadership. Throughout our association with the benighted political construct that has become the European Union, it has always been Tory leaders who have blazed the trail.
The oddest thing, though, about the whole of the Anderson piece - devoted to Tory strategy on the EU - is that he doesn't mention the European Union once. That has to tell you something - the love that dare not speak its name?
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