To the rarified surroundings of the Upper House, where the newest member of the government took his place on the red leather of the ministerial front bench. Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton attracted quite the crowd yesterday when he was introduced for the first time, with one peer remarking that they had not seen the Tory benches so full since Covid. It was a similarly full turnout this afternoon when the new Foreign Secretary made his debut at the despatch box.
Turning it on thick with his fellow peers, Cameron remarked happily on his newly enhanced surroundings: ‘When I look at the ornate carved wooden panels that surround us, and compare them to my now-infamous shepherd’s hut, I can tell you this is already a significant upgrade.’ He said that Peter Mandelson had sent him a ‘charming welcome’ but that his New Labour rival had dubbed him a mere ‘comeback novice’. Cameron quipped ‘To make three comebacks you need both his prodigious talents and you need to be sacked twice by the PM, which is a fate I’m hoping to avoid.’
A keen student of history, Lord Cameron also recalled his first time in the Lords, as a researcher, listening to Harold Macmillan’s maiden speech of 1984: a ‘thoughtful, measured evisceration of the late Lady Thatcher’s government and its handling of the Miners’ Strike.’ No such condemnation of the incumbent premier would happen today, he promised the smiling peers. And it wouldn’t have been a true DC appearance without a couple of not-so-subtle digs at his longtime rival Boris Johnson. Cameron pointedly remarked that he hadn’t been sat in the wings:
Waiting to take back control… nor am I Cincinnatus hovering over my plough. I leave all classical elusions and indeed illusions for that matter to another former PM with whom I shared a number of educational experiences.
Cameron concluded with a reference to the first time he addressed the Lower House at PMQs as Tory Leader: ‘It is an investment in a brighter future, and I should know, because I was the future once.’ Cue chuckles all round.
Keep it up Dave and maybe they’ll asking you to lead from the Commons once more…
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