Hague has no desire to be leader again
William Hague has told BBC’s Breakfast with Frost that he has no desire to replace Iain Duncan-Smith as leader of the Conservatives.
Instead, he praised the work which IDS had done since taking over as leader, saying that he is ‘doing the right things’.
Hague resigned as leader of the Tories after the 2001 General Election defeat. Despite their poor performance in the polls, he has remained a firm favourite of many Conservative backbenchers for his abilities in Parliament.
Last week, Crispin Blunt, after resigning as Shadow minister for trade and industry, called for the return of Hague as party leader. He described the former leader as ‘exceptional’, whilst he talked of IDS as a ‘sub-Blair creature’.
Despite the support for his front bench return, William Hague told David Frost that: ‘I no more sit there thinking that I want to be leader of the Conservative Party again, than I think about being the next person to fly to the moon. I have had that experience. It didn’t work out exactly as it was intended to, much as I enjoyed it.
He continued: ‘I am not looking to do it again or to come back into the front line of politics in any form in the next few years, so the answer is a categorical no.’
However, he did not rule out the possibility of a return years down the line: ‘Ask me what I will be doing in 20 years time – I don’t know and I won’t rule anything out. Who knows what will happen in politics in decades ahead.’
Despite William Hague’s support for IDS, the knives were well and truly out today as former cabinet member David Mellor called for his immediate resignation.
‘I thought the decision of the Tories to select Iain Duncan-Smith was a sign they were becoming a small group, talking to themselves, not wanting to communicate with the wider nation,’ he said.
