David Cameron today signalled he would not fight to keep Britain in the EU “come what may” as he also admitted he sometimes regrets introducing five year fixed-term parliaments.
The Prime Minister stressed he was determined to renegotiate the UK’s membership of the European Union before an in/out vote in 2017.
He told business chiefs in London the EU needed to be reformed, with the single market secured, immigration problems tackled and Britain no longer signed up to “ever closer union”.
At the CBI annual conference, he said: “These things can be negotiated and we can then hold that in/out referendum and give the British people a proper choice about staying in a reformed European Union or opting not to belong to it.
“That is a plan, that is a strategy to secure the best future for Britain.
“Simply standing here and just saying ‘I will stay in Europe, I will stick with whatever we have come what may’, that is not a strategy, that is not a plan, and that won’t work.”
Mr Cameron has called for a fundamental change over the free movement of people in the EU, to restrict the flow of migrants to the UK.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel is believed to have warned he is pushing Britain towards an EU exit unless he waters down his demands.
Sir Michael Rake, president of the CBI, stressed most companies would vote to stay in the EU because it was “overwhelmingly” in the UK’s national interest.
He told 1,000 delegates at the gathering that the UK faced two choices:
“One, in which we risk looking inward, shutting ourselves off from the world in the face of inevitable global change and where we reject the power of free and competitive markets to drive progress.
“The other, in which we embrace the openness which has always been the foundation of Britain’s success — to trade, to people, to investment and to ideas from abroad, and of competitive markets at home. British business will always choose openness.”
Mr Cameron also admitted today there were times he regrets introducing five year fixed-term parliaments.
His comments follow calls from his party to abolish fixed terms and again hand the Prime Minister power to kick off an election at will.
Mr Cameron said: “I gave up the power to set the timing of an election. While sometimes in the shower in the morning I quite regret that and think it would be quite nice to have that flexibility, actually it’s good for our country.”
Under rules brought in after 2010, calls for an election outside of the five-year set date must be backed by two-thirds of MPs.
The change makes it harder for a future Prime Minister to run a minority government.
