So Cameron can try to shrug-off the result of the Syria vote but… When he can’t carry his own party on such a fundemental matter such as war or peace, when a substantial section of his own party rebels against him; that is to say that they have no confidence or trust in him; when his reckless rush to seek approval for a strike makes Ed Miliband look competent and statesmanlike; the whiff of decomposition must be wafting around Downing Street.

With Thatcher’s deposal the issue was supposedly ‘Europe’ but in fact there was a great deal of disquiet on the Tory back benches about the Poll Tax. Are we going to see history repeating itself? The beginning of the end for Cameron, ostensibly about his disasterous handling of the Syrian vote, but with underlying concerns about the effects that his policies are having, and their electoral effect on the Tories?

When Milliband looks more statesmanlike than you do you know there is a problem.

2 selfish boys trying to score points off each other is my reading.

There is no requirement for the prime minister to have a vote on going to war.
David Cameron was probably quite aware that the vote would go against him otherwise he wouldn’t have needed to call the vote in the first place.
He has avoided being the prime minister that gets us into an unpopular war (unlike Tony Blair) and when people say how can you stand there and do nothing he can point to the vote.
If anything he has managed to save face and shown that democracy can actually work sometimes.

duplicate

Firstly, it’s my belief that Milliband will be our next PM.

But, I don’t see it as a problem when a PM puts something as controversial (without meaning that to imply either course of action was necessarily wrong) to a vote, loses the vote and then abides by the decision of that vote.

I’d also disagree that Milliband came out of this looking either competent or statesmanlike!

with my limited political ability / knowledge I’d say no.

Why? Well, becuase who’d step into his place? I think he needs to take a lesson that his public schoolboy arrogance based leadership style is over. Its time for the people to be listened to, its time for the UK to be more inclusive and spend its money looking after itself.

Lets be righteous and conscientious yet quietly sitting in the background consolidating whats good about our country and making its industry and growth stronger. Cameron could accept the defeat graciously, listen, and try to deliver that, or he could buck that trend and lose office and we’ll go around this circle of ludicrous “leadership” once again.

Waging wars isnt the way to go.

IMO

Does seem a bit of that going on.

Fair play to him for putting it to the vote though knowing full well there was a good chance of losing. My understanding is that he could have ordered strikes without a vote. Though to do that without the support of parliament would probably be more of a nail in his coffin than the lost vote.

To be fair Cameron has never been a particularly successful leader of the Conservative Party, he failed to win a general election despite Labour being in government for 13 years.

A short slide down would probably be more accurate imo.

PM puts forward a proposed Course of Action.
Action is voted against by the Democracy.
Plan is dropped.

How is that a loss? The winner here is the democracy.

There is no requirement for the prime minister to have a vote on going to war.

Whilst Cameron could have legally used the royal prerogative, he still needed Parliament’s approval. Failure to do so would have caused the coalition government to collapse. He had no choice.

As a long time labourite, and particularly a loather of the toffs and their attempts to demonise the poor and make them the scapegoats for the structural failures of our modern capitalist system, I can only reflect that Cameron has tried to do what he considered the right thing regarding the situation in Syria, tried to go about it in a reasonable and consensus-based way, has pledged to abide by the will of the people as expressed by their elected representatives (yeah, there’s a debate to be had about that, but it’s the system we’ve got) and I’m actually pretty happy with him this morning (on this matter at least).

And, as stated above, he’s kinda in a “no-lose” situation – if the US led intervention in Syria turns into another horror, we’re not involved, and if Assad continues to be able to gas his own people, napalm schoolyards etc. he can rightly claim that he tried to do something about it, but was prevented from doing so. If the likes of Adam Afriyie and David Davis continue to snipe at him from the sidelines, then, so what, it’s not like they weren’t already doing that. It also neutralises UKIP’s attempt to make this another issue on which to disagree with, and poach voters from, the Tories.

Milliband is in no different position to Cameron on this – both of them were backing intervention until it became clear that they didn’t have the support of enough of their party on it, and have had to back away.

I don’t think he could have done anything differently.

In his opening speech to the commons yesterday he said, intervention still looked very unlikely at this stage, he has merely ticked all the boxes a leader should.

As for Milliband coming out well, are you joking!
Where’s the opposition?

Shirley the person who comes out best in all this is Farage, no?
Whilst I believe that is his stance, even if it wasn’t, as soon as he saw the other 3 stand on one side of the line at the beginning of the week, all he had to do was stand on the other!
Political gold for him!

Well he went down for the 8 count yesterday, dont know if it is over yet.

Scary thing is that disalussioned Conservatives will vote UKiP 🙁

Markie – Member

Firstly, it’s my belief that Milliband will be our next PM.

Dream on. If the economy continues to make good, it’s Cameron all the way.

It’s all about the bucks, pal. Everything else is just conversation.

How is that a loss?

For a Prime Minister not to have the support of parliament on such a important foreign policy issue as taking military action is extremely serious, and it very much undermines his or her authority.

Well, becuase who’d step into his place?

Boris and yes I’m deadly serious, he will be our very own slightly more educated George Bush.

There was two votes last night. The Cameron-backed one was voted down. But before that, the Miliband-backed amendment – that was actually much the same but requiring a slightly higher burden of “proof” – was also defeated. Two warmongers separated by a fag paper.

How many Tory front-benchers resigned their position yesterday, and how many Labour?

Yes, there was much posturing and choreography involved, but DC’s judgement was off.

Firstly, it’s my belief that Milliband will be our next PM.

😐
Sorry state of affairs when the best leaders this country has to offer are Cameron, Milliband and Clegg.
Would sir like a shit sandwich, a glass of piss or a vomit soup?

However shit Cameron is, he’ll never get near Blair who was re elected despite waging war at every single opportunity.

He has avoided being the prime minister that gets us into an unpopular war (unlike Tony Blair) and when people say how can you stand there and do nothing he can point to the vote.

I think the difference is Iraq was suspected of having chemical wepons (which they didn’t), Assad is alegedly bombing civilians with chemical wepons (which it’s hard to rationalise the counter arguments).

I believe if we handn’t gone into Iraq they’d be in the same situation as Syria is now, which they’re not far off anyway but that’s a different argument. And if Iraq hadn’t happened the vote would have gone the other way last night.

Boris and yes I’m deadly serious, he will be our very own slightly more educated George Bush.

Watch him carefully, he plays the clown very well, but he’s very clever.

Sums our country’s politics up really. We have a democracy, the democratic process is used and all of a sudden the PM is penned to be 5 miles up sh*t creek without a paddle.

If he had won the vote he would have been penned as a war monger and in 5 years time when we are still bogged down in a Syrian conflict with no end in sight we would all b criticising the decision to go to war.

And that I think sums up the entire issue. Don’t get involved in Syria and people question the ethics of watching thousands of innocent people die.

Get involved and people questions the ethics of going to war and watching thousands of innocent people die.

Personally I am pleased the vote went against *at this stage*. We have to wait for the UN weapons inspectors report and we should at least explore all diplomatic routes via the UN.

There may come a time when intervention is the right course of action but to wade in now without a proper plan would not end well for any party.

How many Tory front-benchers resigned their position yesterday, and how many Labour?

One Labour front-bencher for sure – shadow transport minister Jim Fitzpatrick. I was particularly shocked as I have long considered Fitzpatrick to be a classic blairite rightwinger.

Cameron was visibly angry at being outmanouvered by milliband, he misjudged the public, labour and more importantly(for him) his own MPs
-the knives are being sharpened

Milliband looked bewildered by it all he didnt come accros well in the debate,
but he did have the nous to listen to his MPs, and come out looking the stronger leader (thats relative though)
his argument to wait for the UN report has saved cameron and the UK from doing another ‘Blair’ – cameron should be greatfull!

Clegg looked absolutely forlorn like he wanted to melt into his seat and his lackluster summing up showed that he didnt actually believe a word of what he was saying or what hed agreed to vote on

It’s William Hague that comes out worst for me.
He’s spent the last year as foreign minister rattling sabres and pushing forward any reason he can to go in to Syria.
Then the government loses the foreign policy vote on his pet issue, and now he looks completely impotent.
I can’t really see how we can continue to have him represent us on the world stage.

Politics is about choices, and what is at issue is Cameron’s rush to war. Had he waited a few days he would have had a better chance of winning the vote. Politics is also about judgement, and by rushing into the vote this quickly Cameron has demonstrated a lack of it, and that he is losing it.

When he can’t carry his own party on such a fundemental matter such as war or peace

I would say that war is where party politics matters the least, to be honest. So it’s no surprise. The vote on Iraq was a free vote too wasn’t it?

I would say that war is where party politics matters the least, to be honest. So it’s no surprise.

It’s a huge surprise for that very reason. The last time the Opposition voted against military deployment was in 1956.

How is that a loss? The winner here is the democracy.

Actually I’m not sure that’s true. The spectre of Iraq debacle hung heavy over the chamber last night. I am pleased that we are not supporting US policy in the region for the first time. However it’s the fear of the electorate that has decided the vote rather than any moral consideration for the people of Syria and the legalities of chemical weapons.

Can we deduce from this decision that we will stand by when regimes murder their own populations regardless of the method? I’m not sure the right decision was made for the right reasons.

Interested in others opinions on this.

We do stand by when regimes murder their own people. Most recently in Egypt.

There’s a difference with Egypt, the opposition isn’t armed there.

However it’s the fear of the electorate that has decided the vote

That is a very loaded way to phrase that sentiment. Another way would be to say that the MPs voted in the way that the people of this country would have wanted – which is exactly what they should be doing.

However I don’t recall being asked my opinion by MP though, so I’m not sure why he decided to vote how he did. Pretty sure that isn’t democracy – the MPs are supposed to be acting on behalf of their constituents, not serving their own interests/ideas/morals. IMO.

PM puts forward a proposed Course of Action.
Action is voted against by the Democracy.
Plan is dropped.

How is that a loss?
The government view was defeated so it does not have/represent the will of the people.
It is never a good thing when you lead the people and they dont follow you and they tell you not to do what you wanted to do. It is not the end. I doubt it is even the start of the end.

It is not the end. I doubt it is even the start of the end.

Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.

But is a government, even one elected with a majority, ever expected to have the will of the pepole ALL the time? Surely that’s unreasonable?

Double post.

But is a government, even one elected with a majority, ever expected to have the will of the pepole ALL the time? Surely that’s unreasonable?

It certainly highlights a problem with the system. There has to be trust between the electorate and the elected. That trust on matters like these has been hugely damaged by WMD, David Kelly and the ensuing chaos that the Iraq occupation caused.

Last night appears to me to be heavily weighted towards that rather than the matter at hand.

I think it was a clever and calculated gamble that has paid off in the long term.

The problem here is Russia – don’t forget that we buy an awful lot of natural gas from Uncle Vladimir.

Cameron had to be seen to be at least trying to do something about Syria – it was probably fairly certain that he would lose the vote anyway, but if the hawks had had their way, then it may well have resulted in Russia turning the taps off and the lights going out.

Upshot is – Cameron seen to be doing something (winner); British people get their way (winner); Russians happy and gas stays on (chicken dinner).

The Yanks don’t have this problem, so it’s more likely that they’ll act unilaterally – I don’t think that the cheese-eating surrender monkeys will go in with Uncle Sam without us there to hold their hand.

Not a beginning of a slide for Cameron but certainly the beginning of a slide for our country.

We are standing by and allowing a murderous dictator to use chemical weapons against his own people, to drop incendiary bombs in school playgrounds (see harrowing BBC clips today) and flout International Law.

We are refusing to use our power, wealth and military influence to stand up for the right thing and, by those actions, have lost the right to say that we are a country to be proud of.