At Westminster, the countdown to the EU referendum is on. And no one is hearing the political clock tick louder than British Prime Minister David Cameron.

Before the British election in May, Cameron promised that if he won, he would hold a referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU by the end of 2017. He also pledged to renegotiate London’s relationship with Brussels ahead of that vote.

Now the Conservatives have a majority, Cameron is safely ensconced in Number 10 and that looming vote on Europe – something of an elephant in the room during the election campaign – can no longer be ignored.

Chris Riddell, political cartoonist at The Observer, explained: “On the Tory right, Europe has been the great divisive issue for a generation. And I think Cameron has been very successful, and the people around him, at managing his own right wing and the coalition of the last five years was very useful for him. He had (former British Deputy Prime Minister) Nick Clegg, who was pro-European, wh