DAVID CAMERON MP

**at the Independent Woodstock Literary Festival.**

Julia Gasper 10 October 2008.

David Cameron was suave and relaxed this morning, answering questions from Simon Kelner, Editor of the Independent. Cameron was speaking at Blenheim Palace, where much of this year’s festival is being held, talking to about two hundred people about himself, and the book “Cameron on Cameron”, a personal profile of him written by the style journalist Dylan Jones. Many of the audience were his Witney constituents. The leader of the Conservative Party has a speaking style that is informal – lots of sort-ofs, and you-knows – but by and large, Good English. He wants people to like him. You can’t imagine Margaret Thatcher inviting a journalist to follow her around for a year and report back on what music she listened to or what she said to her spouse last thing at night.

Asked to describe himself, Cameron said that he was patriotic chap, passionate about Britain and convinced that it has a wonderful future, although he didn’t deny that right now it’s in a heck of a mess, along with most of the rest of the world. In order to succeed, Britain needs the “right values”. The right values make good economic sense, according to Cameron, because of the costs of “social failure” for tax-payers. As for himself, he is just a straightforward, very upright and ethical bloke who enjoys a Sunday joint at home with his family – not the sort he used to smoke when he was at Eton.

Nobody asked Cameron any really probing or awkward questions, such as, has capitalism failed? What can you offer young people? How will you finance the tax-cuts you have been promising, now that the economy has gone into tailspin? Why are the French buying our nuclear power stations? Or, is the Lisbon Treaty dead? The toughest question he faced was, when does a government with a low vote lack moral authority? He replied cautiously that he hoped to raise the turn-out in future elections. Cameron is critical of the Human Rights Act of 1998 and said we need a Bill of Rights instead. Funny, some of us thought we already had one dating back to 1688?

Mostly Kelner and the audience asked him cosy, easy questions to which he gave very friendly answers, which were actually rather non-commital. When the Marquess of Blandford asked him what, as PM, he would do to help Britain’s Heritage, Cameron replied that he agreed that it was terribly important and that lots of tourists come to see stuff like Blenheim and Castle Howard and all that. But he did not make any rash promises. Similarly, he said that the government in this crisis should be “doing more” to help people facing re-possession because of mortgage arrears, but he did not say what exactly it should – or even could, legally – do.

This was a very pleasant, friendly and sociable occasion in an elegant venue, the Blenheim Orangery, looking out on the splendid topiary gardens and fountains, radiant in the autumn sun. It was not a very searching or revealing interview, and while Cameron is selling books, he is not giving away any secrets.

Blenheim Palace: The Independent Woodstock Literary Festival