The Tories must unite to stop Farage from entering No 10

When the Second World War ended, the universal view was that it must never be allowed to happen again.

- MICHAEL HESELTINE

Winston Churchill articulated the idea with the words, “We must create a kind of United States of Europe.”

Harold Macmillan set us off on our controversial post-imperial journey; Ted Heath secured our accession to the treaty of Rome. Margaret Thatcher's greatest achievement was to help create the European single market; John Major secured the Maastricht compromise that prevented free movement and kept us out of the single currency. I worked for them all, and remain convinced of the arguments in favour of Europe. If the Conservatives want to return to power they would do well to remember what our party achieved then.

The economic collapse of 2008 and the Covid crisis have contributed to the lack of confidence in governments. The right-wing equivalents to the fascists of the 1930s are back on the march: Le Pen in France, AfD in Germany, Fdl in Italy, Vox in Spain and, conspicuously, Reform in this country. Much of Donald Trump's language in America coincides with words here in Europe. The immigrant has replaced the Jew as the problem which needs a solution, although recent events here have cast a dark shadow.

I want the Conservatives back in power. But it is time that the party wakes up.