Deputy prime minister's anger at David Cameron's tactics at European summit emerges after he initially backed move
The deputy prime minister, Nick Clegg, has admitted he was "bitterly disappointed" by the outcome of last week's European summit when David Cameron wielded Britain's veto.
He warned on Sunday morning that Britain could be left "isolated and marginalised" in the wake of the summit.
"I'm bitterly disappointed by the outcome of last week's summit, precisely because I think now there is a danger that the UK will be isolated and marginalised within the European Union," he told BBC1's Andrew Marr Show.
"I don't think that's good for jobs, in the City or elsewhere, I don't think it's good for growth or for families up and down the country."
He said he would now be doing "everything I can to ensure this setback does not become a permanent divide".
Clegg spoke by telephone to the prime minister at 4am on Friday as talks ended in Brussels.
The Lib Dem leader said: "I said this was bad for Britain.
"I made it clear that it was untenable for me to welcome it."
He said Tories welcoming the outcome of the summit were "spectacularly misguided".
At prime minister's questions last Wednesday, Conservative backbenchers urged Cameron to show "bulldog spirit" in Brussels.
But Clegg said today: "There's nothing bulldog about Britain hovering somewhere in the mid-Atlantic, not standing tall in Europe, not being taken seriously in Washington."
He warned the UK was "retreating further to the margins" of Europe.
Clegg dismissed calls for a referendum on Britain's relationship with Europe, saying: "Far from retreating further to the margins, which is what some Eurosceptics want, we should be re-engaging fully and we are going to have to redouble our efforts in doing so."
He added: "There is no case for a referendum when there is no transfer of sovereignty of power.
"This is the irony: we were never being asked as a country to transfer any sovereignty whatsoever from the United Kingdom to the European Union.
"What we were being asked to do was consent to a new set of arrangements which would allow the eurozone to do something fiscally.
"What David Cameron clearly needed was to bring something back to show that safeguards were secure, and that didn't happen."
Clegg said if he had been at the summit then "of course things would have been different".
"I'm not under the same constraints from my parliamentary party that clearly David Cameron is," he said.
But he dismissed talk of the coalition breaking up.
"It would be even more damaging for us as a country if the coalition government was to fall apart," he said.
"That would cause economic disaster for the country at a time of great economic uncertainty."
Challenged that Britain could end up outside the EU, Clegg said: "I will fight that tooth and nail.
"A Britain that leaves the EU will be considered irrelevant by Washington and will be a pygmy in the world when I want us to stand tall in the world."
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Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/dec/11/clegg-bitterly-disappointed-cameron-veto
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