Cameron 'better off staying at home' than giving EU reform speech

The Dutch are increasingly uneasy about Prime Minister David Cameron coming to the Netherlands to make his speech on Britain’s future in Europe, with some critics saying he’d be better off staying at home.

Friday’s speech, billed as one of the most important by a British leader since the second world war, is expected to see Cameron call for exemptions from EU rules and moot a referendum, in a bid to appease eurosceptics at home.

But such strident nationalism within the world’s largest trading bloc has even the traditionally anglophile Dutch worried about the potential impact on European Union solidarity and stability.

The speech will be preceded by talks in The Hague with centre-right Prime Minister Mark Rutte, a close ally of Cameron. But he will be noticeably absent during the actual speech, to be given in Amsterdam.

Like Britain, the Netherlands is a triple-A rated country, a major trading nation and a believer in budgetary discipline. But the previously cosy relationship between Cameron and Rutte is evolving.

His VVD party has toned down its euro-scepticism since entering a coalition with Labour (PvdA) last year. The PvdA’s foreign policy spokesman has called for Rutte to distance himself from Cameron’s words.