Prime Minister David Cameron’s office sought to calm a row over the forthcoming EU referendum on Monday after appearing to suggest that ministers must campaign for Britain to stay in the bloc or quit.
The Conservative leader is negotiating with EU leaders to try to change Britain’s terms of membership with the European Union before holding an in-out referendum by 2017.
Speaking at the G7 summit in Germany yesterday, Cameron said his position was to “renegotiate, get a deal that’s in Britain’s interest and then recommend Britain stays in it”.
He added: “If you want to be part of the government you have to take the view that we are engaged in an exercise of renegotiation to have a referendum and that will lead to a successful outcome.”
His comments were viewed in the press and by eurosceptic Conservative lawmakers to mean that ministers who wanted to campaign for Britain to leave the EU would have to quit the cabinet.
“It’s pretty plain — there’s not much room to interpret — that anybody who is going to vote against and campaign against continued membership of the European Union would have to leave government,” former Europe minister David Davis told BBC radio.