Cameron biography: Ashcroft makes new debauchery claims about student days
- 9 years ago
An unofficial biography of David Cameron written by the former Conservative donor Lord Ashcroft has made a series of claims about his involvement in a drug-taking environment at university, a bizarre dinner club initiation ritual and his knowledge of the peer’s offshore tax status.
The publication of extracts in the Daily Mail, two weeks before the Tories’ autumn conference, is a sign of how far Ashcroft has fallen out with the prime minister, who is said not to have followed through on a promise to give him a significant job after the 2010 general election.
Ashcroft wrote that he had a personal “beef” with Cameron because he did not give him a role in the coalition, claiming Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrat deputy prime minister, had blocked it. Cameron later reconsidered and offered Ashcroft a job as a junior whip in the Foreign Office. The biography also makes claims about the prime minister’s time at university, saying an MP had seen photographic evidence that Cameron put a “private part of his anatomy” into a dead pig’s head as part of a dining club initiation ritual.
The publication of extracts in the Daily Mail, two weeks before the Tories’ autumn conference, is a sign of how far Ashcroft has fallen out with the prime minister, who is said not to have followed through on a promise to give him a significant job after the 2010 general election.
Ashcroft wrote that he had a personal “beef” with Cameron because he did not give him a role in the coalition, claiming Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrat deputy prime minister, had blocked it. Cameron later reconsidered and offered Ashcroft a job as a junior whip in the Foreign Office. The biography also makes claims about the prime minister’s time at university, saying an MP had seen photographic evidence that Cameron put a “private part of his anatomy” into a dead pig’s head as part of a dining club initiation ritual.