Dave's EU speech: waffle, platitudes and vague promises

By Alexandra Swann

This morning David Cameron gave his long-awaited speech on his vision of our future relationship with the European Union. While it wasn’t the tantric experience we were promised, for the first time Cameron is talking about the possibility of Britain leaving the European Union which is undoubtedly a victory for Ukip and, more importantly, public opinion.

What did we learn? There will be no referendum unless the Conservatives win a majority at the next General Election; Cameron will first launch consultations into the sort of renegotiation that no one with the faintest knowledge of Brussels politics believes possible; Cameron is keen for Turkey to join, with the door open to others; and the “in” campaign has begun, with Cameron’s full backing.

What we saw this morning was a shameless and thinly veiled attempt by Cameron to win back the votes he knows he will need to form a Conservative government in 2015. He knows that the rise of Ukip is his single biggest problem; the party have been polling up to 16 per cent and won 21.8 per cent of the popular vote in the recent Rotherham by-election. It is estimated that Ukip could cost Cameron 51 seats, handing power to Labour. It was a desperate appeal to Eurosceptics; Cameron pleading “vote for me, or you will never have your referendum” or, more accurately, “if you vote for Ukip and cost me my majority, you'll only have yourselves to blame when the referendum never happens”.

Read more at: The Telegraph