William Hague: 'We have to build new alliances with the emerging powers'

On the eve of the Tory conference, the foreign secretary discusses Libya, Turkey and Britain's changing place in the world
Foreign secretary William Hague
Foreign secretary William Hague has managed to tread a diplomatic line on key issues such as Britain's relations with the EU. Photograph: Antonio Olmos for the Observer

When a 16-year-old delegate roused the Labour conference it was inevitable that comparisons would be drawn with William Hague, who displayed a similar precocity at the same age at a Tory conference 34 years ago.

"I didn't see the film of it so I didn't see myself in the mirror," he says. "I read about it. People in their teens come up to me and say: 'We need your advice, because you made a speech. How should I go about it?' I generally say: 'Don't do it.' Then they look so deeply disappointed and go ahead and do it anyway. It becomes for 30 years the main thing that you're known for. Maybe finally – I've been foreign secretary for a year and a half now – it's perhaps no longer the main thing, but it's still right up there."

He laughs from a red leather chair in his gilded suite at the Foreign Office, the most opulent of ministerial quarters. In his early months here, civil servants and Conservative MPs alike grumbled that Hague was an underwhelming performer as foreign secretary. The critics grew in volume in the first stages of the crisis in Libya when he had to account for a botched evacuation of British civilians and a bungled special operations mission. Now those noises-off have died away. That's partly because the success of the Libyan intervention has reflected well on Hague and his efforts to give the action international legitimacy. It's partly because the convulsions in the eurozone, which he predicted during his unhappy stint as Tory leader a decade ago, have given him the aura of a prophet. It is also because he is beginning to flesh out a distinctive vision of British foreign policy more fitted to what he calls "a multi-polar world".

The charge of lassitude was always unfair. "I've been away [on holiday] for five days in the whole year. Every single holiday this year has been interrupted. However, I'm not complaining at all. That's just because it's been an extraordinary, fascinating and, on the whole, successful year, I would maintain. The Foreign Office as a whole is at its busiest, I'm told, since the second world war."

At the recent United Nations General Assembly in New York – "it's like the AGM of the world" – he did "50 to 60 meetings". He goes on: "It's diplomatic speed-dating." That included bilaterals with counterparts "whose countries are difficult to visit", including the foreign ministers of Iran and Cuba. This is of a piece with Hague's conviction that British foreign policy has to be less exclusively focused on Europe, the US and China. "The world is not going into concentric blocs of power. It is actually going into a diffusion of power with more centres of decision-making than ever in human civilisation. That requires you to place yourself in far more hubs of power than ever before. You can't just say we're going to do it all in Brussels, Beijing and Washington." Hague's mission is to "build whole new alliances with the emerging powers". He boasts that his department, exceptionally in austerity Whitehall, has increased its number of ministers from four to six. "We have ministers going to places where no ministers have been for decades or even ever".

Might not emerging powers regard this as a desperate attempt by a declining former imperial power to maintain its place in the world? "In my view, that is an outdated internal British perception of ourselves. That is not the foreign perception of ourselves. Brazil is looking for British help to modernise its navy. It wants to expand trade with Britain. The governments of Latin American countries are delighted with the increased engagement. They love it.

"Latin America is an economy considerably bigger than China's and growing almost as fast, and yet we've all heard about China, but that whole continent has been neglected. And so has south-east Asia and so have parts of Africa."

Coming closer to home, Turkey is "a rapidly growing player and one of the countries that I work with the most". If "you add up who I make the most phone calls to" the foreign minister of Turkey is up there with Hillary Clinton. Hague "very much" wants to see Turkey become a member of the European Union, an ambition strongly opposed by some other member states.

Many in his own party will have a cardiac infarction if that means large numbers of Turkish migrant workers arriving in Britain. Hague acknowledges "people have to be won over", but remains emphatic. "I wouldn't be put off by freedom of movement because I think it is a strategic neccesity and economically beneficial to bring Turkey into the EU. Turning away Turkey from the EU would be a great, long-term – a century-long – error by Europe."

He cites the Libyan intervention as an illustration of "the importance of bilateral relations and new networks of alliances". It also relied on "the closest co-operation with France since the second world war, maybe more than in 1945 if you think of how Churchill and De Gaulle used to argue with each other". Hague, biographer of William Pitt the Younger, is one of the few front-rank politicians with a sense of history.

One of Britain's older alliances, Nato, did not emerge from the conflict looking so good: a majority of its members, including Germany, left a minority to do the heavy lifting. Nato, we suggest, is not sustainable on this basis. "It would be better if everybody pulled their weight and it was disappointing that some didn't. I would go so far as to say that."

Pressed to name and shame those who didn't do their fair share, he smiles: "Having become a diplomat, that's as far as I'm willing to go."

Hague, the diplomat. This is a transformation for the erstwhile Tory leader who was projected as the plain-speaking Yorkshireman who tells it like it is. Hague, the diplomat, is also a strikingly different character to the politician who once tapped Tory xenophobia by railing that Tony Blair was turning Britain into "a foreign land".

He doesn't much care to be reminded of that. On the other hand, he doesn't mind at all when it is recalled that he once described the euro as "a burning building with no exits". He cannot entirely conceal some pleasure in the realisation of his prophecies of euro doom. "We're all, I suppose, satisfied when we've been proved right. Creating the euro without recognising that drove them towards a closer fiscal integration was an illusion which was part of our critique at the time. That was one reason why we didn't want Britain to join. And they should now be very grateful that Britain didn't join. Imagine us trying to say in Britain that we will now bail out the countries in the euro."

He doesn't argue when we describe the latest rescue measures as no more than "a sticking plaster" on profounder problems. "Clearly there are continuing issues. Let's put it that way." The vote in Germany to ratify more funding for the European stabilisation fund was "a step forward" but "it's very important for additional measures to be taken that bolster confidence in the whole system."

The logic of his argument about the euro is that the project is fated to fail and that Greece ought to exit the euro rapidly, not least for its own sake. He smiles at the invitation to say so: "You're inviting me to go further down my reasoning on this, but I don't think it helps."

Hague, the diplomat, can't say that Greece should leave. He is a member of a British government terrified by what the implosion of the eurozone could mean for our economy. "I yield to no one as a critic of the euro, but it is in our interest that it survives and is stable. We want them to succeed in that, we want them to put out the fire in the burning building."

He is wary of other impacts on Britain. "It will be important in any changes in the way the European Union works to protect our national interest. We're looking hard at that now. It would be very important that a caucus was not created to then impose decisions on the 27."

To those diplomats and others who feared that Hague would bring a frothing loathing for all things European to the Foreign Office, his performance has been a pleasant surprise. He remains a gut eurosceptic, but is one governed by a pragmatic head. He speaks proudly of his role in the imposition of EU-wide sanctions on the brutal regime in Syria. He is pleased to be part of a common position on Palestinian statehood. He offers a new trade deal with South Korea as another example of the power of the EU working in concert.

For a section of Conservative opinion, Hague's capacity to see value in the EU is a terrible disappointment. A significant body of Tory MPs are frustrated that their leaders aren't exploiting the convulsions in the eurozone to seize what they see as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to rip up the rule book. Hague says he has already delivered on some of the eurosceptic agenda by "constraining the EU budget" and passing a law requiring a referendum on further major treaties. It is not his fault that he can't satisfy Tories over the application of the working time directive and the powers of the European Court of Justice. In those areas, he has to bow to their power-sharing deal with the Europe-friendly Liberal Democrats.

"The EU does have too much power, in our view. But this is a coalition government. We have an agreed programme on which the Liberal Democrats gave a lot of ground. Any large-scale change in the treaties is for future years. It's not on the cards at the moment."

Not all eurosceptic Tories buy the coalition as an excuse for not satisfying them. They suspect that Hague and David Cameron use the Lib Dems as an alibi for not having a war with Brussels that the prime minister and foreign secretary don't want to wage anyway. Others think their one-time champion Hague has been beguiled by Europeanist mandarins at the Foreign Office. "I've not been captured by anyone here," he insists. "You can be confident that nothing has changed my views. I came in with the 'in Europe, but not run by Europe' belief and I remain of that belief."

To those in his own party who want out of the EU altogether, he says "no" to their demands for a referendum on membership. He is blunt about it: "Our place is in the European Union."

Hague is also very influential over the domestic direction of the government. He, Cameron and George Osborne, the big Tory three, have regular, private meetings to determine strategy.

We suggest to him that the cohesion of the coalition is now strained by the increased aggression towards the Tories which is being displayed by the Lib Dems. Hague shrugs: "You don't from the inside see such a change."

He maintains that the cabinet has "a more united spirit" than during the New Labour years and "than the last government I served in at the end of 18 years of Conservative government". His Lib Dem at the Foreign Office, Jeremy Browne is "a great minister". Hague suggests that the Lib Dems are just posturing when they claim they are fighting ferociously with the Tories. "We really did come together, particularly to rescue the deficit position. It's too important for both parties and for the country to allow any occasional disagreement or bit of rhetoric to damage the coalition. I find the atmosphere, when you sit with David Cameron and Nick Clegg and other senior colleagues examining an issue, it's a wonderfully refreshing rational discussion actually in which you know party identity is not the first consideration."

To calls from within his party for a more robust rightwing agenda, Hague says "it is very important" to stay on the centre ground. "The Conservatives must keep that ground and, funnily enough, the Labour party is vacating that ground in their rhetoric. Labour leaders who say they're not Tony Blair are moving away from that ground."

So there you have it: William Hague, the centrist, the coalitionist, the internationalist, the admirer of Tony Blair, the diplomat. And he says he hasn't changed.

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