It's war as Major takes on Thatcher over leadership Nicholas Watt, political correspondent Wednesday August 22, 2001 The Guardian John Major will today throw his weight behind Kenneth Clarke in the Tory leadership contest, intensifying the party's civil war in the wake of Margaret Thatcher's provocative intervention. As the party embarks on its most serious round of bloodletting in years after Lady Thatcher warned that Mr Clarke would be a "disaster" for the Tories, Mr Major will praise the former chancellor as the candidate best placed to reach out to the middle ground. The former prime minister, who has never forgiven Iain Duncan Smith for his role as one of the Maastricht rebels in the mid 1990s, will appear on Radio 4's Today programme this morning as ballot papers drop on to the doormats of 300,000 Tory party members. This will be followed by a lengthy article in this week's Spectator magazine. The presence of two former Tory prime ministers, who loathe each other, on opposing sides in the Tory leadership contest will intensify what is turning into a bruising civil war. Mr Clarke, who will face Mr Duncan Smith in their only public debate of the campaign on BBC2's Newsnight tonight, tore into Lady Thatcher within hours of her warning. On the Today programme, he accused Lady Thatcher of holding extreme views on Europe which had prompted her to plot against Mr Major. Pointedly refusing to use her title, Mr Clarke said: "Mrs Thatcher was heavily involved in encouraging people to rebel against Maastricht. I think Mrs Thatcher was more disloyal to John Major than Ted Heath ever was to Mrs Thatcher." Mr Duncan Smith said that nobody should be horrified by Lady Thatcher, who was a "very successful prime minister". But the Clarke camp wheeled out a succession of grandees to warn that a victory for the Thatcher favourite would lead to electoral oblivion. Lord Heseltine, the former deputy prime minister, asked on The World at One: "Is Margaret's endorsement going to help that generation of younger people that we've got to attract back? I don't think myself that that is the case." Ann Widdecombe, the shadow home secretary, said that Lady Thatcher should have kept her views private. "Lady Thatcher became prime minister 21 years ago. It is time to move on." The force of the Clarkeites' response reflected their anger that the former prime minister believes she "owns the party" after she backed the winners in the last two contests - Mr Major in 1990 and William Hague in 1997. But their remarks reflected a feeling that Lady Thatcher's blunt language has provided the Clarke camp with a chance to tap into fears among many party members that Lady Thatcher's hold over the party has contributed to its catastrophic performance in the polls. Full article at: http://politics.guardian.co.uk/conservatives/story/0,9061,540590,00.html Michael Keaney Mercuria Business School Martinlaaksontie 36 01620 Vantaa Finland [EMAIL PROTECTED]
