So 130 MPs have backed the Baron/Bone amendment to the Queen’s Speech. There will be Labour and other parties in this group, but reasonable estimates suggest that 100 Tories went through the ‘aye’ lobbies. This isn’t a rebellion, because the whips have given backbenchers and PPSs a free vote, and to that extent things could have been worse because there were no aggressive resignation speeches. But it is the strongest expression of euroscepticism since the Coalition formed.
Spinners will try to argue that as this was a ‘relaxed’ free vote, 100 Tory MPs regretting the absence of a bill in the Queen’s Speech isn’t a bad thing for the leadership. This might have had more currency if the party hadn’t decided to rush out a draft bill at the last minute.
The size of this uprising also confirms that ‘Europhile’ really is a dirty word for many Tories. Many who supported this amendment were not exactly skipping through the lobbies as they did so. They were still annoyed with John Baron for pushing it to a vote after the publication of the draft bill. But many told Coffee House that to abstain or vote against would be to suggest they weren’t properly eurosceptic. Perhaps this means those who most fervently want to continue pushing Cameron on this can hold the rest of their party to ransom with other votes.
It will also be interesting as the details of the backroom negotiations behind this vote emerge to see whether the whips really did ask MPs to reject it. Even saying ‘it’s a free vote, but we’d rather you support it’ would have undermined the leadership’s claim that this was a chillaxed vote.
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