EXCLUSIVE: 'Brown is finished,' says Ken Clarke

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

But the Tories may not win the next election either and a hung parliament is a distinct possibility, says Ken Clarke who also warns that Barack Obama could turn to Germany or France as European allies if the UK is too isolationist. Rory Baxter reports exclusively from a Nottingham University conference

Gordon Brown is finished and there is no way Labour can win the next election but the Tories might not win either – which makes a hung parliament a distinct possibility, according to Ken Clarke, who has returned to the front benches this week as shadow Business Secretary.

Clarke was speaking at a conference at Nottingham University held in December last year which looked at whether the Conservatives were ready for power. Asked whether a Tory government was a certainty, Clarke said: "It's not inevitable that we're going to win but I do think that Brown cannot win a majority. It's probably his high watermark right now, he's finished and they can't change. So Labour can't win but a hung parliament is not at all impossible, a multi-party parliament could be possible but as a British Conservative I regard that with a sense of deep horror because in the middle of a crisis that's exactly what you don't want. But that is undoubtedly a risk at the next election."

Clarke also spoke of his party's relationship with the new President of the US, Barack Obama. Calling uncritical support for Bush-Blair interventionism "a disaster", he said: "A lot will depend on relations with Europe, because Obama doesn't want his strongest European ally led by a right wing nationalist, he wants them to be a key player inside Europe and he'll start looking at whoever is in Germany or France if we start being isolationist."

He added: "I think the need to be working with Obama will influence my party on Europe. It is still firmly Eurosceptic but it's now moderate, harmless Euroscepticism. It's a bit silly sometimes like which group do you join in the European parliament but full blooded stuff like renegotiating the treaty of accession is as dead as a dodo. We've got lots of ideas on European policy on energy, security, relations with Russia, climate change, all that kind of thing [but] somebody like me is far more relaxed about all that [and if the Tories] get into office the pressure of the American alliance will make them more European."