Thatcher: strong tones

Baroness Thatcher is warning that Britain must not be afraid to forge new alliances outside the EU.

She will argue this week that Britain should begin to withdraw from the European Community, dubbing it "fundamentally unreformable".

"The blunt truth is that they need us more than we need them," she writes.

The former premier claims Britain joined Europe to break through tariff barriers and was duped into believing that the community would be about trade.

"The forces which would push Europe in a direction other than that which we hoped were in truth much stronger than we then believed. We were, I am afraid it now appears, a little naive."

She gives a damning assessment of the future shape of Europe as a "United States of Europe" which will fail in the absence of a common language.

"Europe is the result of plans. It is, in fact, a classic Utopian project, a monument to the vanity of intellectuals, a programme whose inevitable destiny is failure: only the scale of the final damage is in doubt."

In a book widely seen as her swan-song, the former prime minister says Britain must build a stronger relationship with the US.

The intervention will anger the Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith who has called on his party to "turn the volume down" on the issue.

Her comments drew a mixed response from Tory grandees.

The former chancellor Lord Lamont backed her remarks, saying the UK's views were completely at odds with the rest of Europe.

"I think that our relationship is one that will force, even possibly a Labour government, to contemplate and think about its relationship with Europe. The Europeans have a completely different idea of Europe from that of most Britons," he said.

"I should be surprised if Tony Blair, after the failure of the Barcelona summit, hasn't come to a very similar conclusion himself," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

Lord Brittan, a former European Union vice-president and cabinet minister in Lady Thatcher's government, described her remarks as "dangerous" and claimed the current Tory leadership had moved to a more realistic stance.

"Her suggestions are unrealistic, undesirable and dangerous. And I think that the present leadership of the Conservative Party is so closely associated with her that unless they unequivocally and immediately repudiate those ideas, they will be assumed to have them as a hidden agenda," he said.

"I think it's important that it should be made clear that these ideas are as she herself says the preliminary step which would ultimately lead to departure from the EU and that that is something which the modern Conservative Party should have no part of," he said.

"What I think is dangerous and insidious is people who put forward ideas which are designed to prepare the way for departure but haven't the courage actually to say that they're in favour of leaving now.

"The very fact that shadow chancellor Michael Howard who has been quite close to Mrs Thatcher for example, strongly says we should stay in the EU, shows that the Conservative Party realises that it would be politically a death-wish to come out and say `We don't want to stay in the EU'.''

Liberal Democrat leader Charles Kennedy said the debate showed there was still a division at the heart of the Conservative Party.

"Iain Duncan Smith must say whether he agrees or disagrees with the disgraceful comments by Lady Thatcher. If he does not he should disown her increasingly bizarre views immediately. He must now tell the British people where he stands on the issue of British membership of the European Union. Mr Duncan Smith must make clear who is the organ grinder and who is the monkey within the Conservative Party on this issue," he said.

Neil Kinnock, one of her former adversaries, also rounded on her foray back into the political arena.

Currently a vice president at the European Commission, he accused Thatcher of practicing "pub bore politics".

"Lady Thatcher is demanding a British stance of one foot on the dock, one foot on the moving ship. That isn't Statecraft, it's pub bore politics. This is 2002. Trying to step out or step back now would guarantee retaining maximum responsibility while exercising minimum power. That must be wrong for Britain," he said.

Thatcher's attack will provide useful ammunition for Labour who will claim that she is merely saying what Iain Duncan Smith really thinks.

Pro-Europe Labour MP Bill Rammell claimed she was revealing the Conservatives' true position on membership of the EU.

"Margaret Thatcher has publicly stated what most of the shadow cabinet believe - that Britain should quit the European Union. Iain Duncan Smith has tried to keep quiet about his anti-European views but Thatcher has lifted the lid on the hate that dare not speak its name in today's Tory party," he said.

"Leaving the EU would destroy British prosperity and leave us isolated and alone. Withdrawal is the ultimate objective of those who are leading the campaign against British membership of the euro; they should be honest enough to admit it."

Over the weekend, Baroness Thatcher signalled that she is set to withdraw from public life later in the year.

Whilst aides insist she is enjoying good health despite a recent stroke, she is said to be finding her current routine too much and wants to spend more time with her husband, Sir Denis.

Last week the former prime minister announced that she will not travel to the Falklands for the 20th anniversary of the conflict.