Ken Clarke really is a chump of magnificent proportions. He has, finally explained exactly what the Tory promise on the Lisbon Treaty amounts to. The answer, naturally, is not much at all!

During the European election campaign Cameron and his team did everything they could to come over all eurosceptic. They repeated their pledge to hold a referendum on the Lisbon treaty at every opportunity, yet when pressed on what this meant if the treaty has already been ratified by the time Cameron takes up residence in Number 10, the response was mealy mouthed. They said they “would not let matters rest there”.

Having singularly failed to explain that phrase during the campaign, Ken Clarke has finally done so on national TV…

Mr Clarke – the shadow business secretary and one of his party’s most prominent supporters of Europe – said: “If the Irish referendum endorses the treaty and ratification comes into effect, then our settled policy is quite clear that the treaty will not be reopened.”

“But it has also been said by David Cameron – and he means it – that it will not rest there, and he will want to start discussions on divisions of competence between national states and the centre of the EU.”

So it seems that ‘not letting matters rest’ actually means ‘have a jolly good conversation and ask if the others would awfully mind handing some powers back to member states’!

NO re-opening of the Lisbon treaty
NO retrospective referendum (Hmm)

Of course, us real eurosceptics could see this coming a mile off. In fact UKIP went to great pains to point out the Conservative policy vaguery. What I want to know now is what Cameron’s plans are in the event he is unsuccessful in securing a restructuring in the EU he so desires?

Needless to say, commenters over at Conservative Home have gone into overdrive.

Below, you can see Clarke on the Politics Show and Sky News exposing the truth of Tory policy and dumping Cameron in the sh*t. In the Sky Interview right at the end Clarke says the Tory front bench is not as Eurosceptic as it once was! Quelle Surprise!