Major'S Appeal For Party Unity Falls On Deaf Ears

What they're doing is creating an impression of disunity, the only consequence of which can be to put into power a Labour government, Heseltine told BBC radio. Labour leads the ruling party in opinion polls by about 20 points. He was speaking soon after John Redwood, a leading Euro-sceptic opposed to closer European ties, challenged Major's ruling that the government would keep its options open on whether to join the European Union's planned single currency. Redwood, who quit the cabinet in a failed bid to oust Major from the Conservative party leadership in July 1995, said events this week had shown that the wait-and-see approach was dangerous.

 

Major tried to defuse a row sparked when finance minister Kenneth Clarke said on Sunday it would be pathetic if Britain were to rule out initial participation in the single currency, due to be launched in 1999, only to join later. Clarke, the cabinet's leading pro-European, was accused by junior foreign minister Sir Nicholas Bonsor, a Euro-sceptic, of going beyond the government's agreed line.

But Major told reporters late on Tuesday that Clarke had been misrepresented in the press and that the turmoil, in effect, was all one big misunderstanding. In clear defiance of Major, Redwood returned to the attack on Wednesday. He insisted that Clarke had stepped out of line by expressing a clear preference for economic and monetary union (Emu) and said it was worrying that he had done so.

We have seen this week how dangerous it can be if you leave all the options open. That can be very tempting for one minister to go further on the airways than he should have done and lead to public dissension, Redwood said. He said he still hoped the government would explicitly reject Emu in advance of the election. Whilst it's still possible to say today that they don't have to make up their mind, by the time we get to the general election we'll be very close indeed to them having to make up their mind, and I think the public will expect more guidance on how they'll do so, he said. But another former cabinet minister, pro-European David Hunt, immediately contradicted Redwood, telling BBC radio it would be foolish for Britain to close its options on Emu now.

He was backed by Heseltine, who said it would be an abdication of Britain's national interest if it denied itself a chance to influence negotiations over the single currency by ruling out participation now.

Major, whose six years as prime minister have been dogged by divisions over Europe, will be hoping that the latest row dies down before the Conservatives' showcase annual conference starts on October 8.

But Paddy Ashdown, whose centrist Liberal Democrats are holding their own conference this week, said the extraordinary feuding showed the Conservatives were in total and utter internal chaos and no longer fit to govern.

The sooner they leave and call a general election so the country can have a decent, strong government again, the better for them and the better for all of us, he said.