David Cameron has revealed Brexit makes him depressed and accused Michael Gove and Boris Johnson of “trashing the government” with their campaign to leave the EU, in a candid interview ahead of the release of his memoirs.

In an interview (£) with the Times before For The Record hits bookshop shelves, the former prime minister explained how he thinks about losing the referendum “every single day” and what the consequences will be.

The cover of David Cameron’s book For The Record. Photograph: William Collins

He also says a second referendum may be necessary to break the deadlock, criticises Johnson’s move to prorogue parliament and accuses him of “sharp practices” in stripping 21 Tory MPs of the whip for rebelling.

In the interview, part of a publicity drive to launch the book, Cameron says the campaign left him feeling like he was caught “in a quagmire”. In his book he calls his former friend Gove “mendacious” and says he and Johnson, now prime minister, behaved “appallingly”.

His harsh appraisal of his former colleagues comes amid a crisis for the Tories in which long-standing members have criticised the party for its perceived lurch to the right and its take-over by no-deal Brexiters.

Speaking from his London home, Cameron told his interviewer, Andrew Billen, that the 2016 referendum turned into a “terrible Tory psychodrama” and his message was unable to cut through.

“I think about this every day. Every single day I think about it, the referendum and the fact that we lost and the consequences and the things that could have been done differently, and I worry desperately about what is going to happen next.

“I think we can get to a situation where we leave but we are friends, neighbours and partners. We can get there, but I would love to fast-forward to that moment because it’s a painful memory for the country and it’s painful to watch.”

Asked if he found sleeping hard, he said: “I worry about it a lot. I worry about it a lot.”

Cameron said he had been under political pressure to hold a referendum in 2016 because there had been a series of treaties and the “issue was not going to go away”, adding he thought about it more than any other decision he made in government.

He reserved his most stinging criticism for his former Tory colleagues Gove and Johnson, who were instrumental in the Vote Leave campaign. He said the pair “left the truth at home,” when it came to the claims they made during the referendum campaign, including the £350m-a-week figure on the side of the Vote Leave bus.

“I loved the explaining and arguing and that side of politics, persuasion, but then, as it went on, I just felt more and more bogged down. It turned into this terrible Tory psychodrama and I couldn’t seem to get through. What Boris and Michael Gove were doing was more exciting than the issues I was trying to get across. I felt like I was in a sort of quagmire by the end,” he said.

“Boris had never argued for leaving the EU, right? Michael was a very strong Eurosceptic, but someone whom I’d known as this liberal, compassionate, rational Conservative ended up making arguments about Turkey [joining] and being swamped and what have you. They were trashing the government of which they were a part, effectively.”

In the interview, Cameron said Gove’s threat of Turkey joining the EU and sparking mass migration was “ridiculous” and accused him of creating a false narrative.

“There was a moment when I think it was Penny Mordaunt said on a Sunday morning show: ‘We have no power to stop Turkey joining the EU’. It’s just not true.”

His friendship with Gove has not recovered and they do not speak regularly.

He revealed he offered Johnson a top-five cabinet job, potentially defence secretary, if he would have agreed to back him in his campaign to remain in the EU.

Criticising Johnson’s claim that a no-deal Brexit was a “million to one” chance he said he thought that prediction was “a little bit off”.

Cameron also joined his fellow former prime ministers John Major, Gordon Brown and Tony Blair in mooting the idea of a second Brexit referendum, to “unblock” parliament.

He has deep concerns about Johnson’s decision to suspend parliament.

“I wanted him to get a deal from the EU that would have passed in the House of Commons. If that was to happen, I would have been elated. But clearly, while he started off down that road, the strategy has morphed into something quite different,” he wrote to Billen after the interview had taken place and Johnson had made his dramatic move.

“Taking the whip from hard-working Conservative MPs and sharp practices using prorogation of parliament have rebounded. I didn’t support either of those things. Neither do I think no-deal Brexit is a good idea.”

On the infamous moment he was caught on microphone humming a tune after resigning, and for which he was heavily criticised for giving the impression he was happy to leave Downing Street and “swanning off”, he said he had been worried about the door of No 10 not opening.

He said he had been caught out before with the door remaining closed while the cameras were on him and he was trying to calm himself down.

HarperCollins reportedly paid £800,000 for the rights to publish his memoirs. Cameron reveals in the interview that the book was not, as was widely believed, written in his £25,000 shepherd’s hut in the garden of his Oxfordshire home but was mostly worked on at his other home in west London.

He has also personally recorded an audiobook version.

Profits are going to charities connected with the armed forces, disabled children and Alzheimer’s disease.



