Ian King on Cameron in the Sun in 2005: "Smarmy Bully"

Cameron is no smoothie... he's a smarmy bully

Ian King
471 words
5 December 2005
The Sun
THESUN

UNLESS he emulates Devon Loch -the horse that fell just yards from the finish line in the 1956 Grand National -David Cameron will become Tory leader tomorrow.
It's proof turkeys can vote for Christmas. For Cameron will not cut it as leader of Her Majesty's loyal opposition.
Why do I say that so confidently? Simple. Along with other financial journalists, I was unfortunate enough to have dealings with Cameron during the 1990s when he was PR man for Carlton, the world's worst television company.
And a poisonous, slippery individual he was, too.
Back then, Cameron was far from the smoothie he pretends to be now. He was a smarmy bully who regularly threatened journalists who dared to write anything negative about Carlton -which was nearly all of us. He loved humiliating people, including a colleague at ITV, who he would abuse publicly as "Bunter" just because the poor bloke was a few pounds overweight.
A recent Sun interview with Cameron generously called him a former Carlton "executive". No, he wasn't. He was a mouthpiece for that company's charmless chairman, Michael Green, who operated him the way Keith Harris works Orville.
The financial press had one thing in common with Cameron -he hated us and we hated him.
Once, after talking to Carlton's unhappy City shareholders, I wrote a story reporting their complaints. Cameron went completely off the dial, writing to my boss, more or less inviting him to sack me.
I dug out a clipping of the story the other week and guess what? A major aspect to the tale was that investors were worried about money Carlton was pouring into ITV Digital, then called ONdigital. Cameron claimed they weren't -insisting the business was perfectly healthy. Well, we all know what happened to ITV Digital. It went bust owing Pounds 1.2billion and leaving scores of Football League clubs, with whom it had a TV deal, teetering on the brink.
Incidentally, should Cameron ever come looking for your vote and you support one of the Football League clubs plunged into financial turmoil by ITV Digital's collapse, you may like to remind him of his part in your team's crisis.
We desperately need a strong opposition to this wretched Government. But Tory Party members must be on whatever Cameron is alleged to have smoked if they think this mendacious creep will provide it.
There is one thing to look forward to if Cameron wins tomorrow. Gordon Brown will absolutely slaughter him across the dispatch box when he becomes Prime Minister.
And, angry as I am at the way Brown is buggering up the UK economy, I shall be cheering him to the rafters.
(C) The Sun, 2005
Document THESUN0020051206e1c50004a
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One last thought on Cameron;That Monday Morning;Opinion
Ian King
79 words
5 December 2005
The Sun
THESUN
11
English
(c) 2005 News Group Newspapers. All rights reserved

ONE last thought on Cameron. Have you noticed how, at 39, he is being dubbed as an up-and-coming man?
Yet West Ham's genius striker Teddy Sheringham, who is just six months older, has veteran status?
The difference, of course, is that the evergreen Teddy is still fit enough to represent his country.
Cameron is certainly not fit to run it.
(C) The Sun, 2005
Document THESUN0020051206e1c50004b

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