Things couldn’t have gone much better for David Cameron over the last fortnight. First there was the launch, then the speech, then the opinion polls and then lots of endorsements. For an increasing number of observers DC seems to be the highly likeable kind of person that Daniel Finkelstein says the Tories need (see today’s Times). The one blight on Mr Cameron’s fortnight has been a simmering row about his possible use of illegal drugs at university. In today’s Telegraph Matthew d’Ancona dismisses the cannabis row as a sideshow. It’s not. The cannabis row has got legs because there are well-founded concerns at the policy views of David-Cameron-the-politician that have been awakened by what David-Cameron-the-student may or may not have inhaled. People who don’t care what David Cameron did when he was ‘young and irresponsible’ do worry what Mr Cameron might enact as a hopefully ‘mature and informed’ Prime Minister. Talk of ‘shooting galleries’ has got them worried.
Mr Cameron has an opportunity to clarify his views tonight, at the first of a number of hustings before MPs. If he doesn’t he might get monstered. It might be more accurate to say he might get ‘Braziered’. Julian Brazier MP’s role in the Portillo campaign’s 2001 demise is also noted by Mr d’Ancona, in his column of today. Mr Brazier asked Mr Portillo about his views on Section 28 and answer by answer Mr Portillo’s liberal views on lifestyle issues started to alarm a sufficient number of Tory MPs. Mr Cameron should be prepared for similarly tough questioning tonight. If the Davis and Fox camps aren’t orchestrating that questioning their candidates don’t deserve the leadership. The evasiveness that characterised his performance before Andrew Rawnsley last week (noted yesterday by Tim Hames) won’t wash with his parliamentary colleagues.
It is better that his colleagues test him now; because the Labour machine will certainly test him later. After a wrong turn on cannabis in the last parliament Labour is becoming increasingly tough towards drugs. Mr Cameron supports an excellent policy on increasing the number drug rehab places but he’ll be in political trouble if he still holds the liberal views that characterised his membership of the Home Affairs Select Committee.
Drugs matter because of the way they contribute to educational failure, crime and social exclusion. Getting this issue right isn’t just a major test of Mr Cameron’s leadership bid - it’s a major test of the content of his ‘modern compassionate conservatism’.
"Our editor, Tim Montgomerie, has been very subtle here, he put the issue into the limelight and like a good tabloid hack he gave it "legs" and the cover of a real story by dredging up some comments Cameron made to the Home Affairs Select Committee. A smear under the cover of earnest "concern" on policy.
Brilliant piece of dark arts work that would make Mandelson in his heyday proud. Well done. Now wash your hands."
Well, well, well, what a surprise. The editor highlights a concern about Cameron and gets smeared for it. Who would have predicted that?
Posted by: Daniel Vince-Archer | 12 October 2005 at 15:13
I'm a Clarke supporter, so have no particular concern in defending David Cameron but all the same I will say this, Whether DC took drugs or not whilst a student is completely trivial and of no interest to anyone. Let's focus on the issues and the personal qualities each of the candidates could bring to the leadership of the party rather than dragging up ancient and irrelevant history.
Posted by: Graham D'Amiral | 12 October 2005 at 15:26
"David Willetts (apparently a "headbanger" according to Jack Stone) once said that libertarianism was a political philpsophy for childless immortals."
David Willetts regularly misrepresents libertarian philosophy and views. Libertarians have families, are often Christians and believe in personal responsibility. Willetts represents libertarianism as libertinism - a howler that would shame an undergraduate. As a friend said, he needs two brains to do what the rest of us can do with one!
Posted by: Selsdon Man | 12 October 2005 at 15:28
Its not an attempt to smear Tim, he is a big boy and knew exactly what he was doing. It was a shrewd move which will have been appreciated by Fox's camp.
Tim is plugged in, he hears the same gossip that I do and we know what the unspoken/unwritten story is here. I don't think Tim was innocently wandering through the transcripts of the Home Affairs Select Committee one day and got the idea for the article. He has heard the same speculative gossip, and shrewdly figured that if he could find a legitimate political reference to drugs by Cameron he could flush out the issue to the discomfit of Cameron.
It was clever, hence my comment.
Posted by: Guido Fawkes | 12 October 2005 at 15:59
Daniel, these unjustified and sarcastic accusations of spin and smear are wearing a bit thin. Tim is perfectly able to defend himself. This story has now been in this blog’s spotlight three times and it is perfectly valid to bring that into question. On this occasion, the thread was started in reaction to positive coverage of Cameron in the Telegraph. Yesterday it was started in reaction to negative coverage. It’s a bit like the drugs question, whichever way Cameron turns, his critics will use it against him.
Posted by: Mark Fulford | 12 October 2005 at 16:09
Whether the intentions were just to discredit Cameron or not, the point is valid. Regardless of his past, what are Camerons views on Drugs now? What are his policies and the policies of the other candidates. Drugs are an important issue because they have an effect on law and order, poverty, quality of life and many other issues. It is not 'cameron bashing' to ask what he intends to do. I am hoping cameron responds to this issue so i can vote for him with confidence.
Posted by: kris | 12 October 2005 at 16:12
I wish I was as clever as Guido suggests I am. When he has finished accusing me of all sorts of things I'd rather he and others focused on my main point. David Cameron held controversial views on drugs when he was on the Home Affairs Select Cttee. Those views are a problem for people like me who have witnessed the huge social damage that soft drug policies cause. Mr Cameron may no longer hold those views but I'd like to know.
Posted by: Editor | 12 October 2005 at 16:18
Does "controversial" mean "trying to think beyond the prevailing tabloid hysterical response to drugs which has failed badly over the last thirty years"?
Posted by: Cllr Iain Lindley | 12 October 2005 at 16:35
"Controversial" is attached to a policy that I believe will only increase drug use and all the associated health, employment and relationship consequences that flow from drug addiction. I don't mind debating drugs with you Iain but can you deal with the substance of my remarks? - not accuse me of being scared of the tabloids...
Posted by: Editor | 12 October 2005 at 16:38
Well said Tim. I'd like to know his views too. If Cameron no longer holds liberal views on drugs, he may well get my support in the forthcoming election.
I do think whether he partook at college, and whether he should say so, are distinct matters from that bigger point.
I also think the idea that anyone who has made mistakes therefore lacks the moral ballast to express an opinion is a stupid one. (I'm not saying that's your view Tim.)
By that token, anyone who has ever driven over the speed limit has no 'right' to be in favour of the speed limit. The argument is palpable nonsense.
We are often best informed by our mistakes. It doesn't make us hypocrites. If Cameron lied about drug use that would be one thing. Saying that he doesn't want to get into what he did when he was barely out of his teens is another. It's safe to assume he hasn't murdered anyone!
Posted by: Tom Greeves | 12 October 2005 at 16:41
I couldn't agree more.
Posted by: kris | 12 October 2005 at 16:43
I also want to come to Tim's defence. I should start by stating that he is a friend of mine, although that's not the point.
This is an excellent blog, and it is a superb forum for debate. But there has never been any suggestion that the editor of Conservative Home should be neutral, and he is entitled to express his views like anyone else.
The notion that he would deliberately set out to smear someone is preposterous, and grotesquely unfair. Tim calls it as he sees it without fear or favour, but he is not a malicious person, and he is not into personal attacks.
I disagree with Tim as to whether David Cameron should declare whether he smoked cannabis. But I totally reject the suggestion that Tim is motivated by a personal vendetta.
Tim articulates important views, and is often sujected to very unfair personal attacks in response. It's a sign of his classiness that he doesn't descend to that level himself.
Posted by: Tom Greeves | 12 October 2005 at 16:50
Cameron's past [or any other candidate's past] can never be completely discounted. It all depends on what he did, and whether someone can tell the tale. We can only presume that he did not answer "no" because he did not want to be proved to have lied. What we do not know was whether it was a one-off puff or was he a regular user,etc. All this was a long time ago and ought not to affect his prospects, but we know that the press will pick it up and some people will be affected by it.
What have far more relevance are his recent views on legalising hard drugs and downgrading ecstacy. His current views on this will need to be examined closely and if he still holds these views I think it will be very damaging to him.
Posted by: Derek | 12 October 2005 at 16:58
If another MP, at the hustings today, asks Cameron whether he has ever done any class A substances in the past, and Cameron declines to answer, do the people who are posting "youthful dope doesn't matter" going to accept that *this* does? It may well not matter to the Cameron trolls who infest this place, but it does to the rest of us.
Posted by: Henry Mackintosh | 12 October 2005 at 17:24
and hey thats democracy...rather be here than in Beijing. Just heard the latest 5 year plan for achieving a 'harmonious society'. Hysterical.
We dont know how lucky we are...
Posted by: tom | 12 October 2005 at 17:39
If Cameron is asked tonight about drugs, he HAS to answer it directly and without any hint of spin, Yes or No. Everyone I have spoken to offline has said the right thing to do is just tell the truth.
If Cameron wont answer the question in front of his own peers, then I think he will lose support. The MPs arent think, they know that politicians arent held in great regard and wont like it if their questions are ignored. Ignore the BBCs questions but do not ignore the MPs of your own Party.
Posted by: James Maskell | 12 October 2005 at 17:41
And for the record Im no Cameron troll...I just intensely dislike people who dont answer questions asked of them.
Posted by: James Maskell | 12 October 2005 at 17:43
'I just intensely dislike people who dont answer questions asked of them.'
Hey James, what are the three things in your life that have caused you most embarrassment?
Posted by: Tom Greeves | 12 October 2005 at 17:49
Bizarrely, DC *wasn't* asked the Class A question, but Clarke was!
Posted by: Henry Mackintosh | 12 October 2005 at 17:50
1. Going out on my first pub crawl aged 18 and getting off my face, embarassing myself in front of my friends and others. I was so drunk I basically passed out in the front patio.
2. My twin brother running away and the local papers making too much of the reasons behind it. I was bullied for weeks after that.
3. Going to a Speaker's Club and being called up to do a 2 minute speech on a random topic (something to do with soap operas and the public). I didnt even know I was supposed to do one... DDs speech wasnt as bad as that one. I lasted the best part of 20 seconds. I havent been to that Speaker's Club since.
And to answer David Camerons question, yes I have. Once and I didnt like it. Im not a smoker and if anything try to persuade people not to smoke. Its a disgusting habit.
Posted by: James Maskell | 12 October 2005 at 18:09
Full marks for rising to my challenge!
Posted by: Tom Greeves | 12 October 2005 at 18:12
Regarding the downgrading of ecstasy, if there is any point to having different classes depending on how harmful a drug is, would this not be a sensible move? Though of course all drugs can be harmful, there can be little doubt that ecstasy is less so than other class A drugs: I presume the 'huge social damage' the Editor has witnessed was more connected with heroin, crack cocaine or similar. Such a move would not necessarily be seen as 'soft', if it were combined with tougher sentencing for the remaining class A substances.
Posted by: | 12 October 2005 at 18:36
Drugs are the cause of the biggest social problems in the UK and most politicians seem to have given up. We need solutions to the drugs problem and David Cameron is right to have opened the debate. I believe the only real solution is to equip the police with better tools ie. make Britain an identified cashless society (with the complete absence of cash, payments can only be made with credit/debit cards or mobile phones and the police can access details of all financial transactions). Too authoritarian for America and Europe perhaps.
Posted by: DougR | 12 October 2005 at 20:07
Interesting idea there DougR. Never thought of that idea. My initial thoughts is that it would be extremely unlikely. Arent we having enough problems with credit cards at the moment anyway?
Posted by: James Maskell | 12 October 2005 at 20:13
It's an intersting idea but in practice it would have huge problems.
Posted by: Richard Allen | 12 October 2005 at 20:35