What to Watch Out For in David Cameron's Chart

The 1922 Committee is a committee made up of the Tory backbench MPs, i.e. those who are not in ministerial positions. They have their own decision-making process, and the Prime Minister needs to keep onside with them. The date is a reminder of the time in 1922 when the backbench MPs forced the party to withdraw from a coalition government.

On 19th May the Committee was reformed, at the suggestion of David Cameron, and by a vote of all Tory MPs, so that ministers also have a vote in the decisions of the 1922 Committee.

This effectively neuters the backbench MPs as an independent power within the party, and MPs were only given a few hours notice that it was being put to the vote. Many backbench MPs are angry about it.

It seems to me to be an authoritarian move by David Cameron, both in itself and in the way he went about it, and by sitting on his MPs now (so as to protect his coalition with the LibDems) he is storing up trouble for the future. The backbench MPs are precisely those who have not been elevated to positions of ministerial power, and Cameron is taking away the bit of power that they do have. A wise leader does not treat his people in this way. Yes, take away power from those who have too much and do your best to smooth it over, but don’t take it away from those who struggle to hang on to what little they have.


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Scorpios understand this, and just how bitter it makes people, how fundamental it is to people that they have their say. But David Cameron is not a Scorpio, he is a Libran who has not behaved very diplomatically. I think that Libra, being a sign of opposites, also has the potential to be divisive, to polarise. Margaret Thatcher, like Cameron, is a Libran, and as time went on, she became an extreme example of a polariser, and in the end it was her downfall.


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Margaret Thatcher, also like Cameron, has Moon in Leo. This is fascinating, because Cameron is her heir, and because the 2 people are apparently so unlike each other. Maybe it is the Rising sign: Thatcher with her judgemental Saturn Rising in Scorpio, Cameron with his more serviceable and thoughtful Virgo Rising (Virgo seems to be the consensus from my piece last week.)

It is early days yet for Cameron as Prime Minister, but there are certain points in his chart that are worth watching:

(1) Moon in Leo. His is conjunct Jupiter, and Thatcher’s is conjunct Neptune. In both cases there is the potential for a sense of entitlement, of regal airs, of taking power for granted.

(2) Unaspected Mars in Leo. When a planet is unaspected, it can act independently of the rest of the chart. Disempowering the 1922 Committee was an act of assertion, even of aggression, that did not seem to have the usual Cameron thoughtfulness behind it. George Bush has an unaspected Mars, and he went to war against Iraq without thinking through what you do with the country once you’ve won.

Neptune is currently opposing Cameron’s Mars: combining this with the lack of natal aspects, and we may see him blundering when he has to take a stand, has to oppose others. I’d say we also saw this yesterday when Cameron took a stand effectively against Europe, stating in blunt terms that the UK would not agree to any further powers being granted to Brussels, or contribute to the Greek bail-out, which has put Europe in crisis. This may have been to mollify his bruised anti-Europe backbenchers, but it also reminded me of the Thatcher days and her blunt opposition to Europe. All he has achieved is to reduce further Britain’s say within in Europe, a continent that amongst other things takes half our exports.

(3) Weakly aspected Sun. All he has is a wide conjunction to Venus, admittedly its dispositor. I think this will emphasise the polarising side of Libra, due to insufficient contact with the rest of the chart, and also a tendency towards authoritarianism. I was a bit shocked in the MPs expenses scandal at just how vicious Cameron was with the MP who had claimed for a duck-house. There were much worse claims going on than this, but all Cameron cared about was how it looked because the MP was upper class.

(4) Mercury in Scorpio square to Moon-Jupiter in Leo. I don’t want to be too hard on his Moon-Jupiter, because I think it can give an ease and naturalness to his leadership. But on a bad day, when he is feeling entitled, there will be a deviousness (Scorpio) to what he thinks and says (Mercury) and a capacity for plotting. The way he dealt with the 1922 Committee was, I think, an example of it. Another way of putting it is that he could flatter you with his regal attention while at the same time slipping the knife in.

This Scorpio-Leo combination is reflected in the Angles of his Progressed Chart, where the MC is in Leo, and the Asc has been in Scorpio since he became leader of the party.