Let Eurosceptics campaign for UK exit, urges MP

Eurosceptic ministers should be allowed to campaign for the UK to leave the European Union in a referendum, Graham Brady has said. Picture: PA

EUROSCEPTIC ministers should be allowed to campaign for the UK to leave the European Union in a referendum if they don’t feel David Cameron has secured sufficient reforms of the relationship with Brussels, an influential MP said.

Graham Brady, the chair of the backbench 1922 Committee, said the Prime Minister’s refusal to relax the convention of collective responsibility risked creating the appearance of “a great rancorous split” in the party.

With a slim Commons majority of 12 meaning the new government could be defeated if just seven MPs rebel, Mr Cameron has been keen to cultivate better relations with rank and file MPs, meeting Mr Brady soon after his election victory.

He will address the ‘22 tomorrow as he seeks to bolster support for his plan to negotiate sufficient EU reforms to persuade the British public to vote to stay in - despite many Tories being determined to force an exit.

Mr Brady said the prospect of a referendum should help avoid “rancour” as ordinary MPs - who have been promised a free vote - would know they could make their views known at the time of the vote.

But with several hardline Eurosceptics around the Cabinet table too, he urged Mr Cameron to follow the lead of Harold Wilson in the 1975 referendum on Britain’s EU membership and extend the same flexibility to ministers.

“Clearly that is a decision for the Prime Minister but my instinct in these things is always that way you have people who have very very strong beliefs about something, it is far better to recognise the strength of those views and to allow latitude and freedom of expression,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Westminster Hour.

“The more you try to constrain people’s views, to limit debate, the more you create tensions which needn’t necessarily be there.

“When it comes to this referendum in 18 months’ time there will be, inevitably, some Conservatives and some Labour members who are on one side of the debate and some on the other.

“The more you recognise that and accommodate it, the less it appears to be a great rancorous split and the more it is just a civilised intelligent debate among people who all have the best interests of the country at heart.”

Mr Cameron has rejected the idea as recently as January, when he told the BBC: “If you’re part of the government, then clearly you’re part of the team that is aiming for the renegotiation”.