‘Sleepwalking to disaster’: Tory backbenchers lay into William Hague – accusing him of appeasing Vladimir Putin and leading Rishi Sunak to defeat at the polls

• Lord Hague accused Liz Truss and Boris Johnson of ‘sowing’ chaos in office
• Backbench Tories have hit back by claiming Lord Hague appeased Putin in 2014 

It is being described disparagingly by disgruntled Tory MPs as ‘Chamberlain’s Cabinet’ – the informal social grouping of Rishi Sunak, William Hague and George Osborne, which Mr Sunak’s backbench critics blame for encouraging the PM to ‘sleepwalk to disaster’ at the next Election.

Lord Hague, who led the party during the electoral wilderness of the late 1990s, has infuriated supporters of Liz Truss and Boris Johnson by saying the two former PMs should take responsibility for sowing ‘chaos’. 

Writing in The Times, he accused them of looking for scapegoats after ‘completely screwing things up’, and condemned them for ‘false narratives of conspiracies and misrepresenting failure as victimhood’.

Lord Hague concluded: ‘If you became Prime Minister, with a majority behind you and a decent term in front of you, but were overthrown amid chaos, there is indeed someone to blame. It’s you.’

Lord Hague (left), who led the party during the electoral wilderness of the late 1990s, has infuriated supporters of Liz Truss and Boris Johnson by saying the two former PMs should take responsibility for sowing ‘chaos’

The retaliation from backbenchers was swift and brutal. Some used the visit of Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky to cast Lord Hague as an ‘appeaser’ in the mould of Neville Chamberlain for ‘failing to stand up’ to Russia’s annexation of the Crimea in 2014, when he was still Foreign Secretary.

Chamberlain signed the Munich agreement in September 1938, ceding the German-speaking Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia to Nazi Germany a year before Hitler invaded Poland. He was succeeded by Winston Churchill in May 1940.

One hawkish Tory said: ‘Hague, like Chamberlain, decided that Ukraine was a faraway country of which we knew little and that our interests were not engaged. 

‘So he allowed France and Germany to set up the so-called Normandy process by which Russia and Ukraine were treated as if they were somehow jointly responsible for the war.’

The MP added: ‘Hague failed to attend the key meeting at Normandy that set up the whole useless cycle of negotiations. 

‘As a direct result of his laziness and apathy, the UK had no say in the talks and was basically frozen out.’

Ms Truss and Mr Johnson have both advocated a tough line on Russian aggression, with Mr Johnson calling for the UK to send jets and tanks to help with the Ukrainian war effort.

Fingers are also being pointed at former Chancellor Mr Osborne, a regular lunch partner of Lord Hague’s. 

Some used the visit of Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky to cast Lord Hague as an ‘appeaser’ in the mould of Neville Chamberlain for ‘failing to stand up’ to Russia’s annexation of the Crimea in 2014, when he was still Foreign Secretary

Mr Osborne is also understood to be in regular contact with current Chancellor Jeremy Hunt.

One senior source said: ‘Rishi, Hague and Osborne are best buddies and all in favour of the suffocating high-tax policies and pusillanimous foreign policy which are seeing us sleepwalking to disaster at the election. Boris is Winston in the shadows. History always repeats itself.’

For his part, Mr Osborne told The Mail on Sunday that claims he was acting as an informal adviser to Mr Hunt and was a regular visitor to No 10 were ‘hugely exaggerated’.

Mr Osborne’s friends say he is very content with his post-political life. Last year he was one of four partners sharing a £26.5 million bonus at the investment bank Robey Warshaw. In December he celebrated the birth of his second child with fiancee Thea Rogers.

A source close to Lord Hague dismissed the Chamberlain jibe last night, saying: ‘This is nonsense when you look at the facts. 

‘William Hague led the demands for EU sanctions on Russia in 2014. He warned European foreign ministers they would have to wean themselves off Russian gas, having rebuffed Russian offers to sell more gas to the UK when other countries were signing up for it.

‘He went quickly to Kyiv when the crisis of 2014 began and co-ordinated policy closely with the Ukrainian government of the time, who were highly appreciative of British support. He was also part of kicking Russia out of the G8.

‘Germany and France did not want Britain in the Normandy talks because we took a tougher line with Russia.’

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