Six Conservative cabinet ministers may exit over EU vote

At least six members of David Cameron’s cabinet could resign rather than campaign for Britain to stay in the European Union, according to a leading Conservative Eurosceptic.

John Redwood, a member of John Major’s cabinet and now a backbench MP, said he knew of at least six cabinet ministers and many more junior ministers who did not believe the prime minister could win sufficient reforms from other EU leaders.

“There are half-a-dozen cabinet members that are pretty strongly of the view that this deal won’t be good enough and it would be better to leave,” he told the BBC.

“Who knows how many of them will actually resign . . . but I think you would need to because it’s so fundamental.”

Following a discussion of Britain's demands at last week's EU summit in Brussels, Mr Cameron said he was optimistic about securing a deal in February, which would allow him to call a referendum as early as next June.

The prime minister, who has linked Britain’s EU membership to its national security, is likely to campaign in favour of remaining in the EU.

Growing pressure

Mr Cameron is under growing pressure from Eurosceptics to allow cabinet ministers to campaign for either side of the referendum.

Former chancellor of the exchequer Nigel Lawson, president of the anti-EU Conservatives for Britain group, on Tuesday became the latest Tory grandee to weigh in.

“It would clearly be sensible in terms of party management to allow cabinet ministers to speak out on both sides once the date for the referendum is set – not least to enable the Conservative party to reunite easily once the referendum is over, whatever the result.

"That is what Wilson decided in 1975 and he was right. He may have been a bad prime minister, but he knew about party management," he told the Daily Mail.

Among the cabinet ministers regarded as leaning towards leaving the EU are home secretary Theresa May, justice secretary Michael Gove, work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith and Northern Ireland secretary Theresa Villiers. London mayor Boris Johnson has sent ambiguous signals about his intentions.

Longstanding animosities

The debate over offering cabinet ministers a free vote on the referendum has pitted veterans of the Thatcher era against one another, allowing them to exercise longstanding animosities.

Former deputy prime minister Michael Heseltine, a lifelong Europhile, said this week that Mr Cameron would make himself “a laughing stock across the world” if he allowed ministers a free vote.

“If they feel so strongly, if the issue is as you say, then they should resign. Although it is quite difficult for me to understand how they’re in the Cabinet in the first place if they feel so strongly,” he said.

Country divided

Former Conservative chairman Norman Tebbit said Lord Heseltine did not understand that the whole country is divided on Europe and that Eurosceptic ministers were determined to back the campaign to leave Europe regardless of what the prime minister demanded.

“Michael would not recognise a principle if it were staring him in the face, unless it was about his own ego,” Lord Tebbit said.