David Cameron faced the biggest rebellion of his premiership on Monday as eurosceptic backbenchers in his Conservative Party vowed to defy orders and vote for a referendum on Britain's EU membership. The vote in parliament's lower House of Commons is not binding but is politically significant, with between 60 and 100 of the Tories' 305 lawmakers tipped to defy Cameron's direct orders for them to vote against the motion.
Defeat for the government is unlikely, because the Liberal Democrats - the Conservatives' euro-friendly junior coalition partners - and the main opposition Labour Party are both expected to vote with the government.
The vote comes after a stormy European Union summit on the eurozone debt crisis in which Cameron and French President Nicolas Sarkozy clashed over Britain's stance. Cameron has imposed a three-line whip on Monday's vote, indicating Tory MPs must back the party leadership or face seeing their political careers stall. Rebels serving in the government would expect to be dismissed.
Foreign Secretary William Hague, who is strongly eurosceptic, insisted that a referendum on being in or out of the 27-member EU was "the wrong question at the wrong time", warning it would undermine the fragile British economy. He added that the Tories wanted powers repatriated from Brussels but they were bound by the coalition government agreement struck with the Lib Dems. "I've argued for more referendums than almost anybody else, I've argued against the euro more comprehensively than almost anybody else," Hague told BBC radio.
"But this proposition is the wrong question at the wrong time. "It wasn't in the manifesto of either of the governing parties. It cuts right across the rules for holding referendums that we have just agreed by large majorities. "It would create additional economic uncertainty in this country at a difficult economic time. "Europe is undergoing a process of change and an in-out referendum people would want to know where the change was going to finish up before they voted." A parliamentary committee ordered the House of Commons vote after more than 100,000 Britons signed a petition asking for a choice on EU membership.