For the Record

By: David Cameron

Narrated by: David Cameron

The referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU is one of the most controversial political events of our times. For the first time, the man who called that vote talks about the decision and its origins, as well as giving a candid account of his time at the top of British politics.

David Cameron was Conservative Party leader during the largest financial crash in living memory. The Arab Spring and the Eurozone crisis both started during his first year as prime minister. The backdrop to his time in office included the advent of ISIS, surging migration and a rapidly changing EU.

Here he talks about how he confronted those challenges, from modernising a party that had suffered three successive electoral defeats to forming the first coalition government for seventy years. He sets out how he helped turn around Britain’s economy, implementing a modern, compassionate agenda that included education and welfare reform, the legalisation of gay marriage, the referendum on Scottish independence and world-leading environmental policies.

David Cameron is searingly honest about the key players from his time in politics. And he is frank about himself – the things he got right and the things he got wrong. He opens up about family life too, including the tragic loss of his eldest son.

We learn why he kept Britain’s promise on overseas aid spending and what it was like to commit British troops to conflicts in Libya, Iraq and Syria. He sets out how he won the first outright Conservative majority in nearly a quarter of a century, and describes the events leading up to the EU referendum, the renegotiation, the campaign – and his thoughts on it all today.

It is the most compelling record yet of what it’s like to lead in modern times and to live behind the most famous door in the world.

©2019 David Cameron (P)2019 HarperCollins Publishers Limited

Critic reviews

"The political memoir of the decade." (Sunday Times)

"I praise For the Record with genuine enthusiasm. It is tastily candid about his colleagues...but also about his own mistakes." (Andrew Billen, Times)

"Arresting...Cameron has always been an easy target. But on reading this book, I think it is impossible for any fair-minded observer to doubt that he was a fundamentally decent, well-intentioned man, who did his best to represent Britain on the world stage and left our nation’s economy in a much better state than he found it." (Daily Mail)

Excellent book

This has been an excellent listen. I was initially daunted by the 30 hour listening time but I have enjoyed every minute of it. It was frank, funny, highly informative of the inner workings of government and, as a traditional labour voter, I was surprised how down-to-earth it was. Of course the petty politicking was irritating but, for someone who almost never writes a full review of and audiobook, I felt compelled to heap lots of praise on this one.

Vile and self-serving

I couldn’t get passed the first chapter listening to this self-serving pity party. Big mistake having Cameron voice it. I’m sorry I bought it.