For the Record. David Cameron
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and another coat of paint would change the party’s fortunes.
I knew this wasn’t the case. Davis wouldn’t be the one to get the Tory car out of the ditch, and I thought the party agreed with me. He had surrounded himself with a rather thuggish crew of former whips from the John Major era, and I rather suspected that a Davis leadership would be like life in a Hobbesian state of nature: ‘nasty, brutish and short’. While he was the front-runner he could win adherents who feared being on the wrong side of him, but the moment people began to suspect he might not win, that fear would go, leaving him a much less formidable candidate.
But I still had doubts. Not so much about getting the job, but about myself and the pressures it would bring, not just on me but also on my family. I was still very young, with much to learn. Could I really do all the different elements of the job? Decisions that would put people’s lives at risk. Coping with the pressure. Prime Minister’s Questions. There were many moments of indecision before the choice was finally made.
My old friend Andrew Feldman played a key role. He told me that I could and should do it. There were also one or two – and it was pretty much one or two – MPs who were similarly convinced. Former SAS officer Andrew Robathan appeared in my office and said that I had to do it. He knew the parliamentary party, and said he was looking at a winning candidate with a winning strategy. Greg Barker, the MP for Bexhill and Battle who had come into the House with me in 2001, was similarly enthusiastic. So was my friend Hugo Swire. Boris was also keen, and generous in coming out for me quite quickly. In a characteristic intervention, he told the newspapers: ‘I hope that David Cameron removes his hat from wherever he has got it, and chucks it firmly in the ring. That hat has got to simultaneously decapitate his competitors and land in the ring.’
Yet in the end it was those closest to me who were the most influential in helping me make up my mind. Most friends were enthusiastic. They could all see that the Tory Party needed a new approach, and they thought I should go for it. The only exception was Michael Gove, who called me one weekend at Dean and pleaded with me not to do it. He was worried about the effect on me, on Samantha and the family. For all the subsequent drama in our relationship, I think he had nothing but the best of intentions in making the call.
My mother and father were nervous. I don’t remember them ever saying ‘Don’t,’ but my dad in particular was not an enthusiast. He was delighted that I was doing the education job, and thought that I should take one thing at a time. But my brother Alex told me to go for it. This meant a lot.
The most important, of course, was Samantha. Just as she had been worried about the effect on our life of me becoming an MP, she was worried about what being leader would mean. She could see why that side of it worried me, but she was also in many ways the ultimate Tory moderniser. It was a crisp spring day in the garden at Dean when she said words to the effect of, ‘What is the point of spending your life in a Tory Party that can’t achieve any of the things that you believe this country needs to do?’ That was what I really needed, and after her words the decision was made. I was running.
To start with, things came together well. George and I met and talked frankly about the situation. He was being encouraged to consider standing, but he thought he was too young, and hadn’t had enough time to develop the sort of story and profile he’d need to succeed as leader if he won. And anyway, his new job as shadow chancellor was a huge challenge. At just thirty-three years old, he was the youngest person in history to hold that role, and he didn’t want to be distracted.
But he did offer to run my campaign. There was no pact, no deal, no agreement about anything, including future jobs; but there was something much stronger. A shared view of the challenge, and an understanding that we would stand together and work together come what may.
The rest of the team was small but professional.
Andrew Feldman was the natural treasurer, and he set about raising the necessary funds, starting with the businessman Phil Harris. My old Carlton boss Michael Green chipped in. We wanted a good range of donors, not to rely too much on any one individual.
Ed Llewellyn, who was working in Sarajevo at the time, took unpaid leave to come and lead my team. Kate Fall, who had worked for Michael Howard, came to work as his deputy. They teamed up with my press officer Gabby Bertin and an events team led by Liz Sugg. All would still be with me when I left Downing Street eleven years later.
Steve Hilton, who had been running his own business after leaving Central Office, and had then gone to Saatchi & Saatchi and M&C Saatchi, would play a key role in working with me to put together the case for change.
Meanwhile, in the House of Commons, I started to sound out MPs. The good news was that the early adopters were just the sort of people I wanted: bright, sane, forward-looking, and popular with other colleagues. The less good news was that there weren’t very many of them. When we first got together in my office in 343 Portcullis House on 13 June there were just fifteen MPs present: Greg Barker, Richard Benyon, John Butterfill, Michael Gove, Boris Johnson, Oliver Letwin, Peter Luff, George Osborne, Andrew Robathan, Hugh Robertson, Nicholas Soames, Hugo Swire, Ed Vaizey, Peter Viggers, and of course me.
We agreed to spend the summer setting out policies and ideas: we could only beat the Davis bandwagon if there was real substance in what we were saying. When it came to parliamentary colleagues, no jobs would be offered, no future roles dangled in front of them as inducements for support. And we would be unfailingly polite and correct. This was a complete contrast to the Davis operation, which used a combination of brutal arm-twisting (‘Support the front-runner or your career is over, matey’) and ludicrous promises (by the end, I heard, he had amassed several chancellors and foreign secretaries).
The early campaign was very heavy going. We couldn’t get more MPs to declare their support. None of the newspapers were backing us. And I was worried that my freshness, a central part of my pitch, might go stale.
The first parliamentary hustings in July didn’t go all that well. The star performer was Liam Fox, who spoke forcefully about the need for change in Europe. And a new issue emerged that was to last throughout the contest – drugs. The MP Mark Pritchard was persuaded (by someone in the Davis camp, we were told) to ask one candidate – Ken Clarke – directly, ‘Have you ever taken class-A drugs?’ Naturally the spotlight fell on the rest of us to answer. I declined to do so, and while many colleagues groaned when the question was asked, there probably was some damage done.
The Daily Mail became quite hysterical about it, publishing a full-page editorial: ‘David Cameron, Drugs and the Truth’. I refused to yield, and declined to answer the question about drug use in the past, saying that ‘Everyone is entitled to a private past.’ My stubbornness won some admirers, and proved that I wouldn’t be pushed around.
On Question Time I answered a question about whether I had ever taken drugs as an MP by saying, truthfully, that I had not, because ‘law-makers shouldn’t be law-breakers’. The more difficult question was whether I had ever done so when I was a special adviser, or between being a special adviser and becoming an MP. I simply didn’t answer it. Frankly, I didn’t want to tell a lie by saying no. Stories began circulating that I had avoided the question because drug use among my friends was commonplace and excessive. This was nonsense. But had I smoked the odd joint with Sam’s friends before being elected? Yes. Not at all frequently, but yes.
All in all, it felt as if the campaign was stuck, and outside our small core there were few who thought we could win. But I knew we had one weapon more powerful than those possessed by any other candidate. A clear, powerful and persuasive political message that I was sure the party was ready for: Change to Win.
This oughtn’t to have seemed as radical as it sounded. After all, the essence of conservatism, and central to the success of the party, is that it adapts. Far from being the ones trashing the Conservative brand and the Conservative Party, we were absolutely convinced that we were the ones who could save them.
Our goal – which became my mantra – was a modern, compassionate Conservative Party. Modern, because we needed to look more like the country we aspired to govern. Compassionate, because our politics