Politics: Cameron in chains

When Conservative leaders come to address the 1922 Committee of Tory backbenchers, they are required to stand outside Committee Room 14 of the House of Commons until the rest of the agenda is completed.

When Conservative leaders come to address the 1922 Committee of Tory backbenchers, they are required to stand outside Committee Room 14 of the House of Commons until the rest of the agenda is completed. Only then are they summoned in. David Cameron likens the experience to ‘waiting outside the headmaster’s study’. But it is worse than that — as he waits, half a dozen journalists watch his every move. If he perspires, it’s on Twitter.

Cameron has done his utmost to get out of this ordeal. When he was leader of the opposition, he used to call his own meetings of the parliamentary party, which he could attend from the start. As soon as he became PM, he tried effectively to abolish the 1922 Committee; but his efforts were defeated. So he has no choice but to cool his heels in the corridor. Last December, he became distinctly bolshie because he had to sit outside rereading his speech for more than a quarter of an hour as the hacks gawped at him.

When Cameron turned up outside Committee Room 14 last Wednesday, however, he was charm itself. He joshed happily about how he was having to look after the kids on his own because Samantha was away. He exuded amiability and confidence from every pore.

And well he might. A year into the job, Cameron is more powerful than he has ever been. He has, in the words of one ally, ‘turned out to be a far better prime minister than leader of the opposition’. He is also, for the first time, a clear winner on the national stage, having helped the No campaign to a two-to-one victory in the electoral reform referendum.