At 5 am this morning, I landed at London’s Heathrow Airport after a near nine hour overnight flight from Nairobi. It was wonderful to spend almost a week with my son Richard, his wife Emily, and their daughter Catrin (now just five). \u00a0It was Catrin’s half term and we able to spend a lot of time together which we both enjoyed enormously.<\/p>\n
Back at home, I find a nation in turmoil – OK, a Conservative Party in crisis – over the issue of Britain’s continued membership of the European Union which is to be the subject of a referendum on 23 June. We are going to have four months of this!<\/p>\n
As I recall, it was a Conservative Government – led by Ted Heath – that took the UK into what was then called the European Economic Community (EEC) on 1 January 1973. \u00a0Again, as I recall, it was a Labour Government – led by Harold Wilson – that renegotiated the terms of membership and held an in\/old referendum on 5 June 1975 (at the time I was a Special Adviser working for the Home Secretary in that Government).<\/p>\n
At some point in the 1980s, the roles of the political parties reversed with the Conservatives going on and on and on about Europe and Labour accepting that membership is best for Britain. In 1975, I voted for the UK to remain a member; in 2016, I shall do the same (note to Boris Johnson – it’s called consistency of political principle).<\/p>\n