VETO THREAT:BRITISH PRIME minister David Cameron faces rebellion from his Conservative backbenchers on a House of Commons vote that would be necessary to ratify whatever deal emerges from the EU summit.
Mr Cameron said yesterday he would have no hesitation in vetoing a new treaty unless Britain’s interests were fully protected, although there is still confusion over London’s ambitions for the talks.
Yesterday there were signals that an even greater number of MPs could vote against the government on this issue than did when almost 100 defied the whip in a vote in October. David Davis, who was beaten by Mr Cameron for the Conservative leadership in 2005, insisted the prime minister must not allow the 17 euro zone countries to form a tighter grouping that would disadvantage Britain.
Mr Davis called for a referendum saying: “The raw politics of this is: if there is a significant change in the balance of power in Europe, it has big implications for our future – that’s the point at which you have to have a referendum.”
Another Conservative, Eurosceptic Douglas Carswell, was scathing: “Back in 1990-something, a British prime minister keen to cut a deal in Brussels but worried about a backlash back home could spin their way out of trouble. “A robust-sounding article in the Sun or the Times, perhaps. Or a manufactured row allowing you to claim you’ve been bravely defending the national interest. Yesterday’s headlines about vetoing a treaty that wasn’t in the national interest were unspun before lunchtime.
“Any concocted row to try to appear robust will today have the opposite effect. What we are seeing in Westminster this week is not a rerun of old Tory battles on Europe,” said Mr Carswell, one of the Tory rebel leaders in October.
Mr Cameron continued to insist that Britain’s primary interest was to ensure the survival of the euro.
Though fellow EU leaders say the UK is peripheral to today’s talks, Downing Street insists Mr Cameron has the cards to ensure protections for its financial services industry.
The prime minister can veto the use of EU institutions, such as the European Court of Justice, to govern a euro zone deal.
Mr Cameron said: “Britain needs those European markets open for our businesses, our goods, our services; we’ve always needed that. But there’s a crisis right now in Europe, a crisis specifically in the euro zone. The euro, the single currency, isn’t working properly.
“That’s having a terrible effect on those countries, but it’s also having a big impact on us, and we need those euro zone countries to come together, to make changes, to sort out their problems, and to get the institutions of the euro zone behind that currency, so they get their economies moving again, and that’ll be good for us.”