SANGUE NOVO...

A partir de hoje, o Partido Conservador britânico tem um novo líder: David Cameron, 39 anos, sucede a Michael Howard, derrotando por larga diferença David Davis na luta pela liderança do partido.
Sendo apontado há muito, como um jovem com um brilhante futuro, David Cameron pretende renovar o "conservadorismo" britânico, assumindo-se como forte alternativa a Tony Blair nas próximas eleições gerais.
Parecem-me descabidas as críticas que já lhe são precipitadamente feitas, apontando-o como o "Blair da Direita" e como um político cuja única arma são os seus evidentes dotes oratórios. Para alguém que se interessa pela vida política britânica, como é o meu caso, creio que David Cameron é muito mais do que isso, sendo que a única semelhança com o líder trabalhista reside - na minha opinião - no facto de chegar à liderança do partido ainda bastante jovem, para além de ser carismático e ter um discurso arejado, inovador e de ruptura.


David William Duncan Cameron was born on 9 October 1966 in London.

The son of a stockbroker, he spent the first three years of his life in Kensington and Chelsea before the family moved to an old rectory near Newbury, in Berkshire.

His father Ian is a former director of estate agent John D Wood and stockbrokers Panmure, where Mr Cameron's grandfather and great grandfather worked.

But the new Tory leader gains his political lineage from his mother's side of the family, whose ancestral home was Wasing, in Berkshire.

His great, great, great grandfather, William Mount, was Conservative MP for the Isle of Wight in the 19th Century.

After prep school, young Dave, as he was then called, followed in the family tradition and went to Eton.

In a strange twist of fate his headmaster, Eric Anderson, had been Tony Blair's housemaster at Fettes public school, sometimes dubbed the Scottish Eton.

School friends say Mr Cameron was never seen as a great academic - or noted for his interest in politics, beyond the "mainstream Conservative" views held by most of his class mates.

He has described his 12 O-levels as "not very good", but he gained three As at A-level, in history, history of art and economics with politics.

His biggest mention in the Eton school magazine came when he sprained his ankle dancing to bagpipes on a school trip to Rome.

Before going up to Oxford to study Philosophy, Politics and Economics he took a gap year, working initially for Sussex MP Tim Rathbone. before spending three months in Hong Kong, working for a shipping agent, and then returning by rail via the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.

At Oxford, he avoided student politics because, according to one friend from the time, Steve Rathbone, "he wanted to have a good time".

He was captain of Brasenose college's tennis team and a member of the Bullingdon dining club, famed for its hard drinking and bad behaviour, an episode Mr Cameron has always refused to talk about.

His tutor at Oxford, Professor Vernon Bogdanor, describes him as "one of the ablest" students he has taught, whose political views were "moderate and sensible Conservative".

After gaining a first class degree, Mr Cameron answered an advertisement for a job in the Conservative Research Department.

He progressed quickly through the ranks and was soon briefing ministers for media appearances.

He worked with David Davis on the team briefing John Major for Prime Minister's Questions, and also hooked up with George Osborne, who would go on to be shadow chancellor and his leadership campaign manager.

He was poached by then Chancellor Norman Lamont as a political adviser, and was at Mr Lamont's side throughout Black Wednesday, which saw the pound crash out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism.

By the early 1990s, Mr Cameron had decided he wanted to be an MP himself, but he also knew it was vital to gain experience outside of politics.

So after a brief spell as an adviser to then home secretary Michael Howard, he took a job in public relations with ITV television company Carlton.

Mr Cameron spent seven years at Carlton, as head of corporate communications, travelling the world with the firm's boss Michael Green, who has described him as "board material".

"I tried to persuade him that he could have a really good career in industry, but he was completely resolute about going back to politics, and I respected him for that. He's good, he's the real McCoy," Mr Green told The Independent.

But Mr Cameron's period at Carlton is not remembered so fondly by some of the journalists who had to deal with him.

Jeff Randall, writing in The Daily Telegraph where he is a senior executive, said he would not trust Mr Cameron "with my daughter's pocket money".

"To describe Cameron's approach to corporate PR as unhelpful and evasive overstates by a widish margin the clarity and plain-speaking that he brought to the job of being Michael Green's mouthpiece," wrote the ex-BBC business editor.

"In my experience, Cameron never gave a straight answer when dissemblance was a plausible alternative, which probably makes him perfectly suited for the role he now seeks: the next Tony Blair," Mr Randall wrote.

Mr Cameron went part-time from his job at Carlton in 1997 to unsuccessfully contest Stafford at that year's general election.

In 2001, he won the safe Conservative seat of Witney, in Oxford, recently vacated by Sean Woodward, who defected to Labour.

Mr Cameron was by now a married man with a family. His wife, Samantha, is the daughter of landowner Sir Reginald Sheffield, she grew up on the 300 acre Normanby Hall estate, near Scunthorpe.

Her step father, Viscount Astor was a minister in John Major's government, with responsibility for broadcasting. Until recently Mr Cameron sat on the board of late night bar operator Urbium with Viscount Astor.

Mrs Cameron, who works as the creative director of upmarket stationery firm Smythson's of Bond Street, which counts Stella McCartney, Kate Moss and Naomi Campbell among its clients, has been credited with transforming her husband's staid "Tory boy" image.

She has a tattoo on her ankle and went to art school in Bristol, where she says she was taught to play pool by rap star Tricky.

The couple were introduced by Mr Cameron's sister Clare, Samantha's best friend and were married in 1996.

Their first child, Ivan, was born severely disabled and needs round-the-clock care.

They also have a daughter, Nancy, 14 months, and Samantha is pregnant with their third child. They divide their time between their London home in North Kensington and a cottage in Witney, Oxfordshire.

On entering Parliament, Mr Cameron rose rapidly through the ranks, serving first on the Home Affairs Select, which recommended the liberalisation of drug laws.

He was taken under the wing of Michael Howard, who put him in charge of policy coordination and then, in May this year, shadow education secretary.

He also served as shadow deputy leader of the house and deputy party chairman.

In his spare time, Mr Cameron plays tennis, often with former leadership rival Liam Fox, and enjoys dinner parties with his close-knit circle of friends, dubbed the Notting Hill set.

With his influential friends and blue-blooded heritage, Mr Cameron has been criticised for not being in touch with ordinary people.

But his easy manner and confidence in front of the television cameras allows him to appear - if not exactly classless - then certainly not the upper-crust figure his background might suggest.