Tory "Mainstream Euroscepticism" means ever closer union

A group of 14 recently elected Conservative MPs have written to the Financial Times to set out what Conservative Home calls "mainstream euroscepticism" which basically amounts to continuing membership of the EU, ever-closer union and a refusal to listen to the majority of the general public when they say they want out of the corrupt EUSSR.

We have to rely on the Tory chief apologist, Tim Montogerie, for snippets of the letter as it's behind the Financial Times paywall (according to the Chair of the Propaganda Committee Montgomerie the letter was sent to the FT to show how important it was) but from what he says their "mainstream euroscepticism" can be summed up as:

• We must take the taxpayers’ side in resisting further bail-outs;
• Liberalisation of trade;
• The principle of subsidiarity;
• Wholesale reduction of the waste for which the European Commission is responsible;
• Above all we must start getting some value in return for the significant sums that UK taxpayers contribute to the EU’s budget

You just couldn't make this up.  This "mainstream euroscepticism" is more eurosceptic than the party line remember but it's basically a re-hash of Wee Willy Vague's "in Europe, not run by Europe" rhetoric that means bugger all, as evidenced by the string of EU power-grabs since the ConDem's came to power.

There is a suggestion that this group - who claim they could have got 100 MPs to sign the letter if it wasn't for those pesky kids they weren't too worried about their jobs as private secretaries to other MPs and they'd had more time - are in some way risking the wrath of David Cameron which is, of course, a nonsense.  They're toeing the party line, refusing to even contemplate leaving the EU as most voters want.  Tim Montgomerie also seems quite impressed (relieved?) that up to 100 Tory MPs could be sympathetic to the idea of "mainstream euroscepticism".  Which is all well and good but why do they think 100 Tory MPs putting their names to a letter calling for the UK to remain a member of the EU despite a large majority of the electorate wanting out is any better than 14 of them signing one?

There is only one party espousing "mainstream euroscepticism" and it's certainly not the Tories.  Having the view that we should leave the EU is apparently "impossibilism" (another "Montgomerieism") and not something that has a place in the europhile Conservative Party.  There's only one way we will every get out of the EU and that's with UKIP MPs fighting for withdrawal in Westminster.