“Consider the following statements about the Prime Minister that have accumulated in my notebook, from a number of those closest to him. All can be described as his intimates, arch loyalists in whom he confides on a daily basis. What is telling is how some of the sharpest insights into his weaknesses come from those who spend the most time with him. Here, for example, is one of his closest government allies: “David is interested in doing his duty as Prime Minister, not in policy or politics or revolution.” Another puts it this way: “He is more inclined to say ‘Don’t frighten the horses’.” And another: “David is more of the steward of the nation than someone fired by a missionary zeal to transform things.” Or this from an old friend: “His problem is that he has never had a burning desire to be anything other than prime minister.” And here is a friend from his wealthy social circle: “David is frightened of people who have stronger views than him, and that includes Sam.'”
The last sentence is damning. Even if you rather like the idea of a prime minister who takes the old-fashioned approach of just running the store without any sort of revolutionary zeal (not always a bad thing in a Tory, let’s be fair), the fact that he fears people with stronger views than his own is, frankly, astonishing if it is actually true.
A non-interventionist Prime Minister was a good thing in the time of Robert Gascoyne-Cecil. I never know why he isn’t more highly regarded.
However, what Cameron is doing by being a limp fish is essentially ceding control to the EU. Prime Minister has almost become an entirely ceremonial role. In principle he could fight to reverse that.
But he is an EU yes man.
Jaded – to the EU I would add the civil service.
The above article explains how easily the Government agenda has (as usual) moved from the one promised in the election to one that could have been written by senior civil servants.
Hence no real reduction in government spending, size or power. No true devolution of powers. A planned expansion of the power of the Home Office. Alcohol minimum pricing, gimmicks such as enterprise zones, no progress at simplifying the tax system, support for specific industries, the return of nanny-state TV adverts, etc etc etc …
Basically the civil service has turned this government, even more quickly than usual, into a job creation scheme for pen pushers and box tickers.
It takes a strong leader to push back on the power of the civil service. And, to state the bleedin’ obvious, Cameron is not a strong leader.
The truth is that enacting virtually everything on every senior cvil servant’s wish list was what Labor did. There was a very brief period after the new government came to power in which something could have been done about it, and that something involved marching into at least half a dozen major government departments and telling the senior civil servants running the department that they were all sacked. Anything other than that would have led to what has in fact happened – the civil servants just tightening their hold.
I would accept that the “only thing he wanted was to be Prime Minister”, but he certainly does nothing for the Country that he is supposed to be running. He seems to be interested in supporting the EU and all it’s works and our People do not count.
He’s not supposed to be running any country. That’s what dictators (try to) do. He’s supposed to be presiding over our government, making sure it doesn’t do anything silly. Or, at least, anything sillier than the people who elected it told it they wanted done.
I’m sorry, I don’t mean to pick on you, Derek – it was probably just a figure of speech – but this is a pet peeve of mine. Until these people drop the ridiculous fascist notion of the country as unitary, single-minded, corporate, entity with a “leader” at the top pulling all the levers, nothing is going to improve. Politicians need to learn their place.
I’m afraid this was clearly predictable, and was predicted, by many people from the day Green Dave was elected Tory leader. As Nadine Dorries said, Dave is a posh boy who has had everything handed to him on a plate. Life has been very good to him, and so the inclination to rock the boat when the system has been so kind simply does not exist. The fact that he was able firstly to lose an election standing against Gordon Brown, and then happily enter into a coalition with Nick Clegg and the LibDems, shows that the last thing Dave wants to do is shake things up (the first thing he wants to do is get himself into Number Ten). “In office but not in power” sums it up pretty well. For a politician like Dave, whose only real world job was as a particularly nasty and mendacious PR wallah, the medium is the message, and his message is “I’m the Prime Minister!”. That’s it, and it’s not enough.
“Politicians need to learn their place.”
Well said. That’s a meme worthy of spreading.
What would worry me is if these statements were how Mr Cameron would like to be seen by outsiders.
Obama has also struck me as a dog who caught the car he was running after all his life and now doesn’t have a clue what to do with it. Given his proclivities, that’s probably a good thing, but it does make you wonder whose hand is up his coat pulling the strings.
By the way, who’s Sam? Cameron’s dog?
What I have not seen here in my years of visits is a statement of the functions of the British government.
What is it supposed to do, as oppposed to how it does not do something competently.
Spiers-
No Cameron is Sam’s “dog.” She is his wife, a daughter in the titled and moneyed gentry if I am not mistaken: whose father, again if I am not mistaken, is the master of, and rent-seeker from, wind farms.
But of course, I may be mistaken.
Check with Dellingpole at the Telegraph when he gets back from Oz.
A wife is a dog that complains. The advantage being that, dogs are somewhat more intelligent and don’t get fat and ugly with age.
MENDICANT –
I probably should not have been so crass before.
I was not aware of how unfortunate you must be.
LOL!
Maybe Cameron is just taking the word ‘conservative’ way too literally?