Fox slams Clarke over Iraq
Conservative leadership favourite Kenneth Clarke has been accused by one of his rivals of undermining the morale of British soldiers with his criticisms of the war in Iraq.
Liam Fox, the shadow foreign secretary, said electing Mr Clarke would make the party “an easy target” for Labour, who would exploit the fact that most Conservatives disagreed with the former chancellor’s views on the conflict.
Mr Clarke, MP for Rushcliffe, has suggested that electing him as leader would allow the Conservatives to exploit government difficulties over Iraq because of his high-profile condemnation prior to the start of the conflict in 2003.
But Dr Fox, who entered the Tory leadership race on Thursday, insisted that it would highlight division within the Conservative front bench.
“You can imagine the situation, can’t you, where most of the front bench would have supported the war and the leader had been opposed to it,” he told Sky News’ Sunday with Adam Boulton.
“That would make a pretty easy target.”
Criticising Mr Clarke’s decision to raise the issue of Iraq in the Tory leadership contest, Dr Fox added: “The decision to go to war was made. To go back over this time and time again is to detract attention away from the very important task of reconstructing Iraq.”
“I think it also is dangerous because it undermines the morale of our troops if they think that they are being asked to carry out military missions that don’t have the support of people at home,” he said.
During the interview, Dr Fox also accused Mr Clarke of trying to win the Tory crown on the back of a “cult of personality” because he was the most recognised of the candidates amongst the general public.
Dr Fox’s comments follow new polls which suggest that Mr Clarke is the most popular choice to become Tory leader after Mr Howard formally steps down next month.
But surveys in both the Sunday Times and the Independent on Sunday suggest that under Mr Clarke’s leadership the Conservatives would struggle to defeat a Labour party led by Tony Blair’s expected successor Gordon Brown.
Read profiles of the Tory leadership candidates.
