If he accepts this charade, I believe Cameron will be signing his own political death warrant

HOW very carefully orchestrated it was meant to be. First, the late-night negotiations on Thursday. Then, a dramatic agreement in the early hours of yesterday morning. Next, the deal would be signed off with a flourish with a so- called ‘ British breakfast’ in Brussels under the guidance of summit chairman Donald Tusk.

David Cameron was then supposed to fly back in triumph to London and summon a Cabinet meeting yesterday afternoon. Then, standing in Downing Street, he would announce to the world that the British people would vote in a referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU to be held on June 23.

Finally, the PM would nestle onto the sofa for BBC1’s The Andrew Marr Show tomorrow morning to explain why he thinks the deal he’d won was very good for Britain.

with a hubristic and breath-taking arrogance, this strategy was outlined in advance to the media by Mr Cameron’s hapless communications team.

But as so often happens in politics, carefully-laid plans can go badly wrong.

And so was the case with the EU summit in Brussels.

For Mr Cameron himself, this has been a professional and personal calamity.

It is now obvious that he has failed to honour his promise to the British people that he would obtain ‘fundamental’ political reforms.

He’d made that cast-iron pledge in his famous Bloomberg speech on January 23, 2013, in which he said there would be a referendum on British membership of the EU if the Tories won the 2015 General Election. Mr Cameron vowed to renegotiate the terms of British membership and, in doing so, restore democracy to the over-bureaucratic and sclerotic EU.

BACK in 2013, many critics viewed Mr Cameron’s pledge as a cynical ploy to appease Eurosceptic Tory Rightwingers and win votes off Ukip. while others were more generous, the talk in westminster was that the Tory leader was unlikely ever to be put to the test because his chances of winning the 2015 General Election with an overall majority seemed remote.

It seemed the best he could hope for was another Coalition government with the Lib Dems, who would assuredly block any referendum. However, the Tories’ election victory last May changed the political landscape entirely.

Of course, this was a great personal triumph for Mr Cameron — but it also presented him with a huge dilemma.

He was duty-bound to follow through on his promise to achieve a ‘new settlement’ for Britain and ‘fundamental, far-reaching change’ of the EU — before holding a referendum.

Since then, despite endless PR spin from Downing Street, the PM has struggled.

The truth is that Mr Cameron always prefers the status quo — to work within conventional parameters and to appease rather than confront established interests. These characteristics are shared by his very close aide, Cabinet Secretary Sir Jeremy ‘ Cover-Up’ Heywood. Perhaps both men acquired that rigid mindset from their time at Oxford University.

And thus, it rapidly became clear that Mr Cameron had no serious intention of delivering the fundamental reform that he had promised.

Indeed, he seemed to have no idea what reforms he wanted.

Incidentally, he would have done himself a favour if he had accepted Boris Johnson’s offer to be the British government’s chief negotiator — rather than give the job to Brussels stooge George Osborne.

As it was, the Chancellor met his European counterparts but they were left baffled about what exactly Britain’s demands were.

This was no surprise because Mr Osborne is the most pro-European member of the Cabinet. At no point did he seem interested in spelling out any concrete demands on how to reform our relationship with the statist, sluggish, anti- democratic and corrupt EU.

For his part, David Cameron made another massive mistake. He dropped all pretence of being prepared to campaign for Britain’s withdrawal if any conditions he might make were not satisfied. He seemed to have become a signed-up member of the Stay campaign.

This was a huge tactical own-goal.

As every experienced negotiator knows, it is only possible to extract meaningful concessions if you make it abundantly clear that you are ready to walk away from the table. Yet Mr Cameron’s had placed himself at the mercy of his European counterparts. To make matters worse, the PM also sent out a series of contradictory messages.

Some of the time, he claimed his ultimate purpose was to reform Europe and bring its institutions up to date so as to make its members’ economies fit to compete with booming nations such as Brazil, India and China.

Yet, on other occasions, he said that he was purely fighting for Britain’s interests.

These two objectives, as fellow European leaders noted, were incompatible.

TO SUM up, over the past few months, Messrs Cameron and Osborne have given a masterclass in how NOT to carry out a negotiation. At no stage does it seem that they have a clearly- thoughtout strategy.

And so, last night, they found that they had almost certainly failed — on all fronts.

Not only had they not achieved that much-trumpeted ‘fundamental reform’ demanded by those Britons appalled by the prospect of a European super-state, but he had also upset Europhiles because the referendum saga had made the UK more unpopular in mainland Europe.

Even if Mr Cameron eventually manages to strike an improved deal, it will amount to very little. Certainly not the promised ‘fundamental change’.

Personally, Mr Cameron will take this setback extremely badly.

Until now, he has been seen as a trustworthy politician. In many ways, he has been a capable Prime Minister. He has authority. He brings charm and grace to the job. He is business-like and has an air of easy command, which normally serves him well when dealing with foreign leaders.

The way he made the Tory Party electable again — after three consecutive defeats to Tony Blair’s New Labour — has to be admired.

He also has significant achievements to his name. For example, his government has carried out an important programme of welfare reform and courageously taken on the teaching unions in order to raise standards in schools.

But I fear that when history is written, David Cameron will be remembered above all for this bungled negotiation over Europe.

He now has a stark choice. He can persist with his flawed strategy and recommend a deal to the British public which, in his heart, he must recognise as hopelessly inadequate and contrary to the country’s interests.

If he follows this path, though, he will be rightly mocked and derided as weak and hypocritical. Inevitably, his personal authority will be badly eroded.

He will be open to accusations that he has behaved like an estate agent trying to sell a property which he privately knows is not worth the price.

In practical terms, many among the Tory grassroots — as well as on his backbenches — will feel betrayed. I predict, therefore, a mass defection by Tory activists as many join the Brexit camp.

Much more serious, the Conservative Party will split.

Ultimately, David Cameron’s legacy could well be as the prime minister who picked a fight with Europe and was so inept and weak-willed that he lost.

That said, there is — even now — a way that he can try to rescue his reputation.

But it would require huge guts and courage — which I fear is not in his nature.

He could announce that he had done his best in his negotiations with his 27 fellow EU leaders, but they were to blame for refusing to accept any sensible reforms.

DRAMATICALLY, he could then say that in view of such myopic intransigence at a time when the EU is facing huge challenges — particularly from migration — he has no alternative but to announce plans for Britain’s withdrawal.

He would be perfectly entitled to do this under Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty which stipulates: ‘Any member state may decide to withdraw from the Union in accordance with its own constitutional requirements.’

Mr Cameron could then announce that he will be leading the Brexit campaign in the run-up to the referendum in June.

If Mr Cameron did this, he would look principled. But don’t hold your breath! Mr Putin might become a Quaker before this happened.

Nevertheless, the Prime Minister could show that he was acting consistently with the Eurosceptic beliefs which he has advocated all of his political life.

Indeed, we were reminded this week how, as a young prospective Tory parliamentary candidate in 1996, he told his party conference: ‘They (Brussels) want a federalist pussycat, not a British lion. It’s up to us to make sure that lion roars — because when it does, no one can beat us.’

Also, he would, at last, he honouring the promises he made in his Bloomberg speech.

History would then accord him the tribute that he had been a prime minister who, at a time when voters had increasingly lost trust in slippery and self-interest politicians, had redeemed the reputation of politics and scored a remarkable triumph for democracy.

Alternatively, he could cravenly accept this week’s Brussels charade and sign his own political death warrant.