David Cameron’s U-turn on Brexit is truly embarrassing

It seems that seven years in a shepherd’s hut has somehow changed Lord Cameron’s mind.

Here was I thinking that he was still in favour of the UK being in the EU, that he must be deeply ashamed and contrite about the damage that his calling and losing of the Brexit referendum has caused to the country he loves, and that he would want to re-establish the closest possible ties with the EU as soon as possible.

But it turns out there is no zeal from Cameron to right the wrongs for which he is partially responsible. He is merely a humble public servant who answered the call to serve again. To serve a party that rejected him, to serve a PM whose policies he fought against, to serve a cause he knows is not in the national interest, and to serve a government that is willing to break international law. The former PM makes the Vicar of Bray look like a man of deep, unbending, moral principle.

Lord Cameron’s grilling by the House of Lords European Affairs Committee was always going to be a rather embarrassing event, where the former PM had to answer questions on why he was implementing a European policy which he previously called a threat to national security and to the economy.

Where he said as PM that the UK’s membership of the EU “maximised” our influence in foreign affairs, now we just have to “make the most” of the situation we are in, he told their Lordships. Far from being a direct answer this is a disingenuous one. Apparently trying to “bend the EU to the UK’s way of thinking used to be “frustrating” and the new ad hoc arrangement is working well (although presumably nothing like as well as it used to when we were sitting round the table, you know being ad hoc and all that).

Lord Cameron also thinks the UK’s relationship with the EU is “positive and driving good results”, is “functioning well” and that “a lot of the heat and anger” has subsided.

The stuff left unsaid and unanswered was: is the relationship as positive and good as it used to be, are the results as good, is the relationship functioning as well as it did pre-Brexit and how much heat and anger is left to undermine that relationship?

The foreign secretary, also said that UK/EU relations were now “much more functional” – heaven knows how dysfunctional they got if this is an improvement – and we just wanted to be the EU’s “friend, neighbour and partner”, which does sound a bit like a pathetic Billy No Mates asking to join the playground games.

But perhaps the best bit is this; apparently the foreign secretary finds it “interesting to come back and see how it is working.” Yes, I suppose it must be “interesting’.

Having called a referendum purely to try to settle an ongoing Tory civil war that has continued virtually unabated for the last seven years, having risked his country’s economy and influence and security (his words) by calling and then incompetently losing that referendum, then having wandered off humming and spending seven years making money, David swans back to the Foreign Office to take a good look at how bad things have got.

If he had said to the Committee, “It is far worse than even I feared, we are a laughing stock, our influence is diminished and we are less secure, poorer and permanently on the outside looking in”, you might think more of the man.

But apparently it is nothing to do with Dave – he is the impartial witness to someone else’s crime. He just wishes to serve, to make the best of a bad job.

God, this noblesse oblige can be a right pain sometimes, but it can make life more interesting. Especially for those stuck sulking in a field, in a shepherd’s hut.