Backwards not forwards

By Caroline Jackson, a Conservative MEP for the South West of England (THE GUARDIAN, 02/03/06):

David Cameron's reputation as a moderniser of his party is now firmly established in domestic policies. Hardly a day passes without a satisfying cry of pain from Lord Tebbit and his acolytes. Yet Cameron continues to use "Europe" as a touchstone of his loyalty to the party's Europhobic right. Although it is presented as a point of principle - "consistency, consistency" - this commitment was made during a wobbly moment in his campaign for the leadership. To gain support from those who might otherwise have voted for David Davis, he undertook to remove the Conservative MEPs from their alliance with the "federalist" centre-right European People's party group.

This commitment is now haunting him. It suggests that in European policy, far from being a moderniser, Cameron is prepared to go back 50 years to a time when this country was just a spectator and not a participant in shaping the future of Europe.

William Hague, George Osborne and Liam Fox have just come back from visiting Washington to kiss and make up with the Republicans, and talk with the Democrats. The plan is for David Cameron to meet President Bush later this year. But can Cameron plan visits to Berlin, Paris, Stockholm or Madrid? He can't, because he knows that he will not be welcomed by Angela Merkel, Nicolas Sarkozy, or the leaders of the Swedish and Spanish centre-right. Indeed, in December the leaders of 11 parties told him that they would refuse bilateral contact with the Tories if they withdraw from the EPP-ED. So what will David Cameron say to George Bush when asked what he is doing to keep Europe on the Atlanticist, open-market path?

In the European parliament laws are made which directly affect Britain. A British Conservative MEP has just led the EPP-ED to victory on the services directive. How could he have done that from a small group on the fringe?

William Hague is visiting some strange places as he tours Europe to find someone to help form an alternative party grouping that will conform to the European parliament's rules. A minimum of 19 members is required from at least five countries. The main candidates are the Polish Law and Justice party (PiS) and the Czech ODS party. Unfortunate acronyms apart, even these are problematic. The PiS is opposed to CAP reform and the ODS can't decide this side of their election later this year. Neither party can be counted on not to join up with the EPP in due course, leaving the Conservatives in the lurch.

The rest of William Hague's list is even more eccentric. He has met Hans Blokland, the sole MEP from the fundamentalist Christen Unie, who advised him to stick with the EPP, and Kathy Sinnott, a solitary Irish independent.

It is time to call a halt to this pointless rummaging in the margins of European politics. After the defeat of the European constitution a new agenda is opening up in the EU - market-opening, social and economic policy reform and the reform of the European budget and the CAP. The Conservatives should be playing a central part in these debates. This would help them to break out of the self- defeating Battle of Britain mentality of the past 15 years, and serve the British national interest. But we cannot do so with the millstone of withdrawal from the EPP-ED alliance round our necks.

Karl Rove is said to have left a blunt message on Michael Howard's answer-phone telling him that he would not be welcome in Washington. Those who David Cameron hopes will be his peers in the next generation of European leadership have sent him a similar message, more polite but equally firm. The Tories cannot stop being the "nasty party" at home while playing nasty in Europe.