Web exclusive: Extended interview with David Cameron
James Forsyth and Fraser Nelson 11:13am
We interview David Cameron for today's issue of The Spectator. Here's an extended
version of that interview for CoffeeHousers:
The most striking thing about David Cameron is how well rested he looks. You wouldn’t guess that he was the father of a ten-month-old baby, let alone Prime Minister. He has no bags under his eyes — unlike his staff. He also seems relaxed. He jovially beckons us in to his Downing Street office and then flops down into one of the two high-backed chairs and urges one of us to take the other: ‘the Chancellor’s chair’, he calls it, with a chuckle.
The last time we interviewed him, during the general election campaign, he was a different man, tired and tetchy. High office evidently suits him better than scrambling for votes. He seems to relish the variety of items on his agenda. Yesterday, he says, he spent the afternoon in a seminar with scientists and businessmen on genomics and its possible commercial applications. His next appointment is with Martina Navratilova.
But these are not easy times for the Prime Minister. His ‘very simple goal, which is to make this country great again,’ by fostering ‘values like responsibility, like family, like genuine fairness where people that put in get rewarded rather than punished,’ still seems a long way off. The economic recovery remains fragile and events in Europe could push the country back into recession. This morning, Cameron had a breakfast meeting with the governor of the Bank of England, the Deputy Prime Minister, the Chancellor and the Business Secretary to discuss what is happening in the eurozone. The financial crisis could turn out to be the defining issue of Cameron’s premiership, a possibility that the Prime Minister is now beginning to acknowledge.
Cameron starts with the premise that the eurozone countries will do what it takes to keep the single currency alive. ‘No one in Britain, however sceptical they are about the euro — and they don’t come much more sceptical than me — should have any doubt about the immense commitment there will be from other European countries to make the euro work,’ he says. ‘We would be kidding ourselves if we thought somehow they’re sitting around thinking, gosh it’s not going very well, how are we going to get out of this one? That’s not what they’re doing. To them the euro is absolutely central to their vision of their membership of Europe — and they will, I think, do pretty much anything to make that work.’
The eurozone, he adds, will have to move ‘towards much more single economic government’. And in that, crucially, he sees a great chance to renegotiate Britain’s relationship with the European Union. Or, as puts it in a slow and deliberate way, ‘There will be opportunities for Britain to maximise what we want in terms of our engagement with Europe.’
Eurosceptics accuse the Prime Minister of having fluffed one such opportunity when he agreed to the treaty change that established a permanent bailout mechanism for eurozone members. But Cameron stresses that he did receive something in return. ‘I got us out of the bailout mechanism which has been used repeatedly and from 2013 cannot be used again, so I think I exacted a good and fair price for Britain going ahead with this treaty change.’ But then he says again: ‘Are there more things we’re going to be able to do? Yes, I think there will be opportunities.’
These words represent quite a shift in the British position. Until recently, the coalition line has been that because a stable eurozone was in Britain’s interests, we wouldn’t capitalise on any crisis to pursue a narrow national advantage. Now Cameron is talking explicitly about ‘opportunities’ and how to ‘maximise what we want’. He has an endgame, then, for the euro crisis, but it’s not something he expects to be playing tomorrow. As he puts it, ‘Sometimes Europe gets to a crossroads and takes quite a long time to decide what it’s going to do.’
Cameron has plenty to keep him occupied at home. On public services, he is keen to persuade people that he remains ‘bold’. He uses the word seven times in a matter of minutes. He wants to make it clear that the government’s recent retreat on the NHS does not mark a general abandonment of reform.
Cameron stresses that he remains a reformer, pointing to his route-map for public service reform coming out — after several months of delay — next week. ‘The Public Services White Paper is a bold and exciting document, and I think the important thing about it is it will help change the culture in the civil service and the government about looking at future public service reform because it lays a bit of a blueprint and it makes points across the public sector so people can see the full direction of reform. So I want this to be a bold reforming government.’ He also boasts about what the government is doing in terms of putting information into people’s hands, allowing them to compare the performances of not only individual schools and hospitals but departments within them. Cameron says with a half-smile that ‘people haven’t really woken up to the full extent of what we’re doing there.’ Later, he says with a flash of passion, ‘If you give people information about what government spends, how it spends it, what everything costs, what local government is doing, information is power and we’re putting that power in people’s hands.’
The paradox of David Cameron, though, is that while he sees himself as a radical, he doesn’t want to be seen as divisive. So policies that pit him against received opinion are a no-go. He is prepared to lead but only at a pace the public are happy with. As Cameron puts it, ‘someone once said that democracy is government by explanation and I really believe that.’ He says with a certain pride that the coalition’s planned overhaul of the NHS is a ‘bold set of reforms and they are back to where they should be, which is evolutionary rather than revolutionary’. The concept of ‘bold evolution’ is meant to sound both radical and reassuring, in the hope that these two contradictory qualities can be reconciled.
Cameron’s ambition is tempered by his desire for the public to feel comfortable with the pace of change. When asked if he has any ideological objection to new state-funded free schools being able to make a profit, he replies that he wants ‘boldness to show results, to embed, to deliver, before you move to subsequent stages’. In other words, free schools can make money, but not before the reforms that introduced them are seen to work.
He cites as support for this approach an argument by Ferdinand Mount, the one-time head of Mrs Thatcher’s policy unit, which argued that government reforms needed a long runway to take off. But Cameron should remember that planes can’t get airborne if the pilots leave the brakes on.
There are, moreover, plenty of people who want to slow Cameron’s government down. We are talking to the Prime Minister the day after the public sector strike. He is keen to defend what he describes as his ‘intensely reasonable’ approach to the unions. ‘I believe in general respect and politeness in the way you handle your relationships with people, including trade unions,’ he says. But then he shifts gears: ‘No one should mistake reasonableness for a lack of resolve and resilience. There is absolute resilience over this issue.’
Cameron emphasises that, ‘I’ve never wanted a confrontation with the unions. It’s not winning a confrontation I want, it is actually reform of pensions and I think that’s very important when you say you could go further on dealing with some of the abuses of trade union power and all the rest of it.’ But if the unions are hell bent on confrontation then Cameron has options. When we ask him about the idea of requiring a minimum turnout for strike ballots or stopping the practice of full time union officials being on the public payroll, he remarks ‘I have sympathy with some of those suggestions, great sympathy in some cases’. One senses, though, that Cameron won’t reach for these weapons unless he’s forced to.
For most of the interview, Cameron — unusually for a senior politician — actually tries to answer the questions. But when asked whether increasing overseas aid by a third is a good idea, he becomes evasive. He remarks wearily that the subject is ‘a bit of a hobby horse’ for The Spectator. ‘Look,’ he says, with an air of irritation, ‘we’re not going to agree about this.’
After a couple of exchanges in which he comments that ‘one of the ways we punch above our weight is because we have got a big aid budget,’ it is clear that Cameron isn’t going to engage on this issue. So we move on. The conversation turns to how Cameron finds the actual job of being Prime Minister. We ask him where he does his thinking, to which he replies, ‘I don’t think in a solitary way. I like thinking by talking.’
Warming to his theme, he starts to talk quickly and energetically, his leg bouncing up and down as he goes. ‘I like thinking by debate, argument. I like being challenged by people who don’t agree with me.’ Cameron is so into his stride at this point that it seems rude to point out that he gave rather the opposite impression a moment ago when we were talking about international development.
‘I love the clash of argument,’ he carries on. ‘I got that from working in the Treasury when I was a special adviser — I like the fact that there was a sort of atmosphere in the Treasury that you could turn up at the Chancellor’s office and have a bloody good argument.’ Cameron feels he has replicated that atmosphere in No. 10. ‘Meetings are quite feisty,’ he says. ‘Because I’ve got characters with strong opinions and ability like Steve Hilton and George Osborne, you won’t be surprised they don’t always agree and I like that, that’s good because you want to have argument and discussion.’ Intriguingly, this suggests that the arguments that matter in the government, or that the Prime Minister remembers, are between Conservatives, not between them and their coalition partners.
In terms of how he does the job, Cameron says that he has had to supplement his desire to give ministers the freedom to get on with things with a fixer role. ‘If you think about how I’ve spent my time in the last month or so, I’ve been spending a lot of time on health, where I think we had a problem, and I think I’ve helped to fix it. I’ve spent some time on justice where I think we had a problem, but I’ve helped to fix it.’
One place where the coalition could soon have a problem is Scotland, where the SNP First Minister Alex Salmond is doing all he can to prepare the ground for independence. Cameron isn’t yet prepared to call Salmond’s bluff and call a referendum now, but he indicates that his patience is limited. ‘I want to treat the First Minister and his government with respect, I think it’s the right thing to do but if the whole of the next few years becomes about tussling rather than governing then there may be a moment where we have to say, okay, we need to answer this question properly but I don't think we’re there at the moment.’
One of the most remarkable things about the interview is that Cameron doesn’t even mention the Liberal Democrats. He doesn’t refer to them once in 45 minutes. He only mentions coalition when saying how difficult it is to make progress on dealing with the European Convention on Human Rights and the flow of regulation from Brussels. Gone are the attempts to talk about a Liberal-Conservative synthesis. Rather, Cameron stresses that the ‘common theme’ of his reforms ‘is pretty standard Conservative stuff of “trust the people” ’. He no longer sounds like a coalition prime minister who happens to be a Conservative, but a Conservative prime minister who happens to be leading a coalition. That is the big change of Cameron’s first year in office.
Previous
James Strong
July 7th, 2011 11:28am Report this commentOf course he's got fewer bags under his eyes than his staff.
Being at the top is a lot less stressful than being 1,2 or 3 rungs down.
The top man can formulate policy and then say 'Make it so;tell me when you've done it.'
The upper-middle and middle then have to get it implemented. That can be tough.
Rhoda Klapp
July 7th, 2011 11:31am Report this commentBlimey. Look carefully at your upper lip in the mirror. I think you'll find there's a fishhook in it.
Nicholas
July 7th, 2011 11:35am Report this commentAnd the Great Repeal Act and Bonfire of the Quangos which the Spectator championed? No questions about those?
Dylan Unwin
July 7th, 2011 11:42am Report this commentAnd you didn't even mention Andy Coulson even once.
Perry the HardHearted
July 7th, 2011 11:47am Report this commentI'm only half way through, but I have to stop ... I've run out of tissues, and I can barely see through my tears!
[afterthought: 'Jim' used to FixIt]
John Hall
July 7th, 2011 11:55am Report this commentNo mention of the haemorrhaging of money to the EU and the Eurozone?
Archibald
July 7th, 2011 11:58am Report this commentI hope that you've spent more time checking the printed version than the title here. Although it begs the question, why should I pay for the Speccie on subscription when you give away this and your cover story? As my subscription fast approaches renewal time, this is indeed a curious way of encouraging me to keep it going.
RCE
July 7th, 2011 12:02pm Report this commentIs the Speccie cutting costs by employing immigrants to spellcheck the headlines? That's twice today.
merlindragon
July 7th, 2011 12:08pm Report this commentI genuinely enjoyed reading this article, thank you! I like hearing slightly unguarded responses to important questions.
RCE
July 7th, 2011 12:09pm Report this commentStopped at mention of his next appointment being with Martina Navratilova. Does he seriously think that's what we have a PM for? What a cruddy, facile charlatan this man is.
For the first time ever I had some sympathy for him over the NOTW hacking as it didn't take place on his watch. No more.
The Laughing Cavalier
July 7th, 2011 12:23pm Report this commentThere seems to be no comment either about the apparent decision to downgrade Britain's armed forces by an order of magnitude.
FvH
July 7th, 2011 12:25pm Report this commentJames and Fraser back in their box
This reads like a puff piece from an inflight magazine
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Peter From Maidstone
July 7th, 2011 12:47pm Report this commentSorry, that was a waste of 5 minutes of my life. Not a single pressing question. It reads more like a piece that would be published in 'Hello' magazine!
Tiberius
July 7th, 2011 1:05pm Report this commentI'm not exactly sure whether Cameron is disliked more than Fraser and James by the serial moaners. It's an engaging competition.
I imagine it was merely time that prevented an exhaustive piece on every aspect of policy, rather than the journalists' lack of skill. But this piece confirms my view of Cameron as a man who wants much of what I and the moaners want, but isn't going to blow his election prospects by crudely forcing the rhetoric or the policy through.
Like a football team manager, he can never quite satisfy the expectations of many of the 50,000 spectators, but like those managers, he at least deserves the chance to fail, which he hasn't had time to do yet.
Pete
July 7th, 2011 1:10pm Report this commentIf the PM thinks that the public are going to put up with their electricity bills being inflated by over 25% to pay wind farm subsidies to overseas companies based in tax havens he is mistaken.
Jabez
July 7th, 2011 1:14pm Report this comment"when asked whether increasing overseas aid by a third is a good idea, he becomes evasive. He remarks wearily that the subject is ‘a bit of a hobby horse’ for The Spectator. ‘Look,’ he says, with an air of irritation, ‘we’re not going to agree about this.’
After a couple of exchanges in which he comments that ‘one of the ways we punch above our weight is because we have got a big aid budget,’ it is clear that Cameron isn’t going to engage on this issue. So we move on."
Why? Why not press him repeatedly and record the exchanges? Why not display his shallow and vacuous arguments and expose his empty-headed prating for the drivel it is?
strapworld
July 7th, 2011 1:15pm Report this commentPeter from Maidstone. Sorry, 'Hello' is far more inquisitive!
This has got to be Cameron's easiest interview ever. I note the great economics writer (Nelson) asked not one biting question, nor one on his favourite subject, immigration (neather).
They mention the fact that Cameron did not mention the Liberal Democrats, forgetting that he is in government only because they agreed to prop him up! They didn't even ask him why he could not beat Brown!
Goodness me, fearless fighters for the truth? Where are our journalists? Send in the clowns.
daniel maris
July 7th, 2011 1:25pm Report this commentWhy wouldn't you be well rested? You've got people to drive you round, do your shopping, look after your kids, cook your food. There's plenty of time for rest and relaxation - Chequers, theatre, drinks receptions et al.
The "work" consists largely of sitting around drinking coffee and discussing things. You have an army of advisors to help you "read" papers.
PMQs are a bit stressful perhaps. You might need a lie down after those.
Andy Carpark
July 7th, 2011 1:48pm Report this commentPigshit.
Fergus Pickering
July 7th, 2011 1:49pm Report this commentI don't know why you should suppose it's the immigrants who can't spell. English journos can't bloody spell.
oldtimer
July 7th, 2011 3:04pm Report this commentWell it did confirm my view that the sole purpose of the enlarged aid budget is to enable Cameron to look big in the recipient countries and to look down on leaders of other developed countries who spend less - and all at our expense. That is not a good enough reason.
The claim that he likes a good argument rings hollow. There is a very good argument to be had about the global warming hypothesis advanced by the IPCC and embraced by this (and the previous) government in the Climate Change Act and the Carbon Plan - which if/when implemented will ruin the economy of the UK. But Cameron will not engage in it - nor will his civil servants or government funded scientists and institutions. On this issue it is lets keep our heads firmly buried in the sand.
EyeSee
July 7th, 2011 4:39pm Report this commentThere is a lot of content here I don't think Dave intended. He is sceptical of the euro eh (though not the EU)? He says they will do whatever they can to save the euro. Now is Britain's time to renegotiate. Nice, but to what end? Supporting the euro is like looking for a flat-headed horse to push a cart. The euro was mainly a vanity project but also a control issue. That it could never work was clear from the start (to everyone but politicians). So what is Cameron sceptical of? The existence of the euro, it's adoption 'too early' or that it could ever work? In our domestic law we have allowed for the EU to tell us what to do (even though the politicians didn't have the legal authority to promulgate such a law), so how is Cameron going to 'renegotiate' anything? It is like a prisoner trying to negotiate with his custodian. Nope, this might serve to make Dave seem like a conservative but actions speak louder than words and at present he is having the kind of 'black is white' conversation so beloved of Tony Blair. I hope for better articles from Fraser.
Verity
July 7th, 2011 5:07pm Report this commentNicholas 11:35 asks what happened to the Great Repeal act and the Bonfire of The Quangoes.
I second that question, although I believe Dave has hauled another 13 or 14 quangoes on board HMS Taxpayer.
Verity
July 7th, 2011 5:13pm Report this commentI liked Andy Carpark's succinct comment.
Having read the comments first, I decided not to bother reading the piece.
denis cooper
July 7th, 2011 5:16pm Report this comment"Cameron starts with the premise that the eurozone countries will do what it takes to keep the single currency alive."
That's always been my premise, as well: that the eurocrats would do whatever they could, legal or illegal, to preserve the present eurozone intact, because if even one of the present member states left then their project would start to unravel.
However that's no reason at all why the UK government should be helping them; on the contrary, the UK government should be doing everything it can to both contain the eurozone and encourage its disintegration.
Verity
July 7th, 2011 5:16pm Report this commentEye See says, "I hope for better articles from Fraser."
Never say Neather.
denis cooper
July 7th, 2011 5:45pm Report this comment"Eurosceptics accuse the Prime Minister of having fluffed one such opportunity when he agreed to the treaty change that established a permanent bailout mechanism for eurozone members. But Cameron stresses that he did receive something in return. ‘I got us out of the bailout mechanism which has been used repeatedly and from 2013 cannot be used again, so I think I exacted a good and fair price for Britain going ahead with this treaty change.’"
What total rubbish - in return for giving other member states a crucial treaty amendment to legalise future eurozone bailouts, over-riding the Maastricht "no bail-out" clauses which were a fundamental prerequisite for Economic and Monetary Union, Cameron secured an informal agreement that henceforth they would either leave the UK out of, or stop using, one of the illegal bailout mechanisms.
This is what he should have said:
"The UK government takes the view that the European Financial Stabilisation Mechanism is illegal under the treaties, and therefore does not recognise the validity of any Council votes taken in that connection and will definitely not be participating in that illegal scheme in the future; and moreover although the UK is not participating in the eurogroup's European Financial Stability Facility the UK government takes the view that it too is illegal under the treaties and is concerned that EU institutions are breaching the treaties through their involvement in its operations."
denis cooper
July 7th, 2011 6:01pm Report this comment"Until recently, the coalition line has been that because a stable eurozone was in Britain’s interests, we wouldn’t capitalise on any crisis to pursue a narrow national advantage. Now Cameron is talking explicitly about ‘opportunities’ and how to ‘maximise what we want’. He has an endgame, then, for the euro crisis, but it’s not something he expects to be playing tomorrow."
Cameron's endgame comes after the eurozone has survived this crisis, with his help at our expense, and resumed its expansion to take in all the other present and future EU member states - having once joined the eurozone an EU member state cannot leave it, and every new member state must commit to joining it - until finally the position of the UK outside the eurozone can be depicted as untenable and it is finally allowed to engulf us as well.
Which in my view is what Major expected and hoped would eventually happen, and so too does Cameron.
Jim Burfield
July 7th, 2011 6:19pm Report this commentScotland cannot have a referendum on independence. It is already independent. The referendum will be on secession.
denis cooper
July 7th, 2011 6:43pm Report this comment"Until recently, the coalition line has been that because a stable eurozone was in Britain’s interests, we wouldn’t capitalise on any crisis to pursue a narrow national advantage. Now Cameron is talking explicitly about ‘opportunities’ and how to ‘maximise what we want’. He has an endgame, then, for the euro crisis, but it’s not something he expects to be playing tomorrow."
Cameron's endgame comes after the eurozone has survived this crisis, with his help at our expense, and resumed its expansion to take in all the other present and future EU member states - having once joined the eurozone an EU member state cannot leave it, and every new member state must commit to joining it - until finally the position of the UK outside the eurozone can be depicted as untenable and it is finally allowed to engulf us as well.
Which in my view is what Major expected and hoped would eventually happen, and so too does Cameron.
denis cooper
July 7th, 2011 7:49pm Report this comment"Until recently, the coalition line has been that because a stable eurozone was in Britain’s interests, we wouldn’t capitalise on any crisis to pursue a narrow national advantage. Now Cameron is talking explicitly about ‘opportunities’ and how to ‘maximise what we want’. He has an endgame, then, for the euro crisis, but it’s not something he expects to be playing tomorrow."
Cameron's endgame comes after the eurozone has survived this crisis, with his help at our expense, and resumed its expansion to take in all the other present and future EU member states - having once joined the eurozone an EU member state cannot leave it, and every new member state must commit to joining it - until finally the position of the UK outside the eurozone can be depicted as untenable and it is finally allowed to engulf us as well.
Which in my view is what Major expected and hoped would eventually happen, and so too does Cameron.
Home Rule for England
July 11th, 2011 12:45pm Report this commentScotland should be allowed an independence referendum immediately. So should England! Many English people are more than fed up with Scotland wants this Scotland wants (and gets) that! Well the time has come for England and the rest of the UK to go our own seperate ways!
Independence for England.
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