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DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Now an in/out referendum on Europe was one of David Cameron’s key manifesto pledges of course.  Well now firmly back in Downing Street he is tasked with delivering it without tearing his party apart in the process.  Andrew Mitchell is one of those who have been through it all before as a whip during the Maastricht Treaty votes in the 1990s and he joins me now from Screverton in Nottinghamshire and a very good morning to you Mr Mitchell.  Well the core question at the moment is the issue which the leadership seem to have kicked into the long grass, should Ministers when the time comes be allowed according to their conscience and their beliefs?  

ANDREW MITCHELL: Well I think the answer to that is firmly yes.  Europe is a deeply divisive issue within the Conservative party but unlike over the Maastricht debate which you’ve just mentioned, there is a very clear road map here which allows us to get through a renegotiation where the Prime Minister will argue for Britain’s interests in a reformed EU and then a chance for everyone, not just politicians but a chance for everyone in the country to have their say in an in/out referendum.  The one thing that would destroy all of that is if there’s a feeling on either side of the debate that somehow there was a biased approach or that it wasn’t free and fair and I think saying that Ministers can’t follow their convictions and their consciences in that referendum, would lend itself to the suggestion that there wasn’t a level playing field in respect of the referendum so my very strong advice to the Prime Minister as his former Chief Whip, would be to allow every Minister to follow their convictions, to follow their conscience and campaign and vote as they see fit when he puts those revised terms to the British public in an in/out referendum.  

DM: So do you think Number Ten has made a bit of a mess of it so far?  

ANDREW MITCHELL: Well I think they’ve made it clear that they are still thinking about it and the Prime Minister made it very clear last week that he was going to make up his mind, I hope he’ll do that reasonably quickly and as I say, I hope he’ll agree to allow Ministers to follow their own beliefs in the referendum.   

DM: Now would you like to be one of those Ministers again following your own beliefs?

ANDREW MITCHELL: Well I have said that I want to return to front line politics but we’ve just won an election, that’s wonderful news, we’ve now got a parliamentary programme to implement, the country is waiting for us to deliver and I’m sure that’s what we’re going to do now.  

DM: But were you surprised not to be asked back immediately after the election?  

ANDREW MITCHELL: I’ve been in politics too long to be surprised by that sort of thing.  The main feeling I felt after the election was obviously great relief and joy that there was a Conservative majority government and great pleasure too that my own vote went up in Royal Sutton Coldfield, my constituents are the jury that I respect and I trust so for me the great joy of that wonderful Friday was that the Conservatives were government again in the first time for 23 years with a majority to carry out the Conservative programme upon which we were elected.  

DM: Let’s continue with those parallels of 23 years ago because as I said, the party then began after its ’92 victory tearing itself apart mainly over Europe.  Do you see the potential of that  happening again given that we are already hearing that there are dozens, scores of Conservative MPs forming themselves together to campaign for no and they haven’t even waited to see what the Prime Minister gets.  

ANDREW MITCHELL: Well I think if you look carefully, what everyone is saying is that they are waiting for the Prime Minister to complete his renegotiation.  He’s got off to a cracking pace since the election, visiting so many of the leaders of the EU countries, he is going to negotiate I have no doubt at all with great skill and vigour and he will come back with a result and then it’s up to everyone to make up their mind.  This is very different from Maastricht, what happened in Maastricht was a Prime Minister had signed a treaty and it was then essential that the government stood by that Treaty in the House of Commons with the two opt out’s that John Major had negotiated and that’s what kept us up night after night, voting at three in the morning, sometimes with a majority of one or two or three.  We used in the Whips office to regard a majority of five in those days as a landslide but now we are in a different position, we’re in a position where everyone supports the Prime Minister’s renegotiation tactics and everyone supports what he’s trying to do – they may not all agree with him at the end of the day but we all support what he’s trying to do – and then there’ll be an in/out referendum.  The only thing that could in my view put the parliamentary party back anywhere near where it was in 1992, is if as I say it doesn’t appear that there is a level playing field and Ministers and Members of Parliament are allowed to follow their own convictions but I’m sure the leadership of the party won’t allow that to happen and that this will be conducted in good humour where everyone at the end of the day feels that they’ve had their say, that it’s been argued out fairly and that the British public have reached a conclusion and that that puts this matter to bed.  That’s what’s in the best national interests as well as being in the Conservative party’s interests, because this is a result that binds.  

DM: But Mr Mitchell, you and I know that amongst those numbers that have formed, you say they are waiting for what comes out but they’ve already formed their opinion, they want to leave the European Union come what may.  

ANDREW MITCHELL: I don’t believe that is the case.  There are certainly people in the Conservative party, certainly people in the country, who want to leave the European Union come what may and they will get a chance to put their case in the in/out referendum but the group of my parliamentary colleagues that has been founded, Conservatives for Britain, they have specifically made clear that they are awaiting the Prime Minister’s renegotiation before making a decision and they will have advice for him on that renegotiation but at the end of the day they have made it clear they are waiting for the end of the renegotiation before deciding but that is absolutely their right.  Any parliament colleague who has views will make up their mind when they have heard the Prime Minister’s renegotiation results and then follow their convictions.  

DM: And in their minds and your mind, is progress on a different but perhaps related in some people’s minds anyway, issue, progress on a British Bill of Rights, in dealing with human rights legislation, is that important too?

ANDREW MITCHELL: Well it is extremely important although it is not really a directly related issue and on that you have got two of the best negotiators in the party, you’ve got Dominic Raab, a newly appointed Junior Minister, and Michael Gove, immensely experienced, trying to find a way through this very tricky and difficult area on human rights.  I mean for me the key point is that we should not leave the European Convention on Human Rights which Britain helped draft and was an original signatory for, it is very important that we don’t leave the European Convention.  I am not prepared to allow my constituents to be denied that access to international justice and if you told me many years ago when I first became a Member of Parliament that a British government, let alone a Conservative government, would want to withdraw from the Convention I’d have thought you were in cloud cuckoo land.  

DM: So you think there is a halfway house, stay in the Convention but deal with the Human Rights Act and institute a British Bill of Rights?  I mean it’s going to be enormously tricky just in terms of the legislative process.

ANDREW MITCHELL: Well I do think it is incredibly difficult and I cannot myself at the moment see a way through it but I do think in Michael Gove and Dominic Raab, who are genuinely consulting parliamentary colleagues, I do think you have got two very fine negotiators there and if anyone can do it they can.  But you are right, it is extremely difficult and quite hard for me as a non-lawyer and layman to see a way through that would protect my constituents in Royal Sutton Coldfield and would enable me to vote for it.   

DM: Good to talk to you Mr Mitchell, thank you very much indeed for your time.  Andrew Mitchell there.