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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
Politics
Andrew Sparrow and Claire Phipps

EU referendum live: IFS says Gove wrong to claim leaving EU could boost NHS spending

Michael Gove (left) and Boris Johnson at the Vote Leave event in Stratford-upon-Avon this morning. The IFS has said Gove was wrong to claim leaving the EU could boost NHS spending.
Michael Gove (left) and Boris Johnson at the Vote Leave event in Stratford-upon-Avon this morning. The IFS has said Gove was wrong to claim leaving the EU could boost NHS spending. Photograph: Phil Noble/Reuters

Afternoon summary

  • The Institute for Fiscal Studies has said Michael Gove was wrong to claim that leaving the EU would boost NHS spending. (See 3.39pm.)
  • Nicky Morgan, the education secretary, is demanding an investigtion into claims Vote Leave may have misled people who are trying to register to vote. In a letter to the Electoral Commission, jointly signed with the Labour MP Stella Creasy, Morgan said:

It has come to our attention that Vote Leave appear to have paid for online advertising to ensure that their campaign website regarding registration is promoted ahead of the Government website that directly enables citizens to register to vote. The Vote Leave campaign site presents users with a form to fill in their contact details and then click on a button which clearly says ‘Register to Vote’. This website, however, does not enable people to register, and therefore could easily mislead people in to thinking that they have secured their ballot paper. By securing a ranking for this site higher than the official registration site, Vote Leave’s underhand tactics could disenfranchise citizens without their knowledge who have in good faith used this site to try to register.

  • ITV has confirmed the line-up for Thursday’s EU referendum debate. Boris Johnson, the energy minister Andrea Leadsom and Labour MP Gisela Stuart will represent Leave. Energy secretary Amber Rudd (Leadsom’s boss), shadow business secretary Angela Eagle and Scottish first minister Nicola Sturgeon will represent Remain.
  • Roberto Azevedo, head of the World Trade Organisation, has told Reuters that if the UK leaves the EU negotiating new trade rules with the WTO could take “decades”. Here is an extract from the Reuters story.

Leading pro-Brexit politicians are confident Britain could do a quick deal with the EU to keep trade flowing. But even if that happens, Britain’s rights at the WTO will be in “a vacuum”.

“I don’t see how just negotiating with the EU is going to obviate the necessity to establish what the parameters are between the UK and all other WTO members,” Azevedo said.

He declined to predict how long such talks could take.

“It could be a few years, it could be decades. But our experience suggests that to expect smooth sailing and quick results would be a high-risk bet.”

That’s all from me for today.

Thanks for the comments.

Boris Johnson increases his lead over Cameron as trusted figure on EU matters

The smart reaction to today’s YouGov poll (pdf) is to remember that polls aren’t always a reliable guide to an election. This, from Ian Leslie, is shrewd.

Still, as my colleague Tom Clark says, there does seem to be trend.

More importantly, two of the non-headline findings in the YouGov poll should be very worrying to the Remain camp.

First, YouGov ask people who they would vote if they knew they were going to be £100 a year worse off if the UK left the EU. When YouGov asked this in early April, Remain had a 9-point lead (Remain 45%, Leave 36%.)

But now Leave has a 2-point lead when the same question is asked (Remain 42%, Leave 44%).

  • Poll shows 8-point increase in last two months in people saying they would leave the EU, even if they ended up £100 a year worse off.

This is particularly interesting because in the past research has suggested that being told leaving the EU would leave people worse off by just £25 a year was enough to swing a poll in favour of Remain.

Second, YouGov asked people how much they trusted various politicians with regard to the debate about EU membership. By some margin Boris Johnson is more trusted than the others. Also, over the two months Johnson’s rating has actually gone up. Here are the figures.

Boris Johnson: -26 net (31% trusting him minus 57% not trusting him) - Up 1 point since early April (ie, marginally more trusted)

Nicola Sturgeon: -33 (Up 1)

Jeremy Corbyn: -36 net (Down 11)

Nigel Farage: -39 net (Up 6 points)

David Cameron : -53 net (Down 10 points)

  • Boris Johnson is far more trusted on EU matters than David Cameron - and the gap between them has widened over the last two months.

Coming after Johnson’s evidence to the Commons Treasury committee (described as “mountains of nonsense” by the Tory chair Andrew Tyrie), his claim that the EU stops shops selling bananas in bunches of more than three, the bogus claim on the Vote Leave battlebus about EU membership costing the UK £350m a week and today’s “triple whammy” hyperbole (see 9.16am and 4.30pm), this is surprising, to say the least. Most politicians are capable of twisting the truth. But Johnson, as my colleague Jonathan Freedland pointed out in a column last month, is one of the few who has been sacked twice for dishonesty.

Sometimes I feel I don’t understand UK politics anymore. If Leave do win the referendum, the explanation will lie somewhere in the factors explaining these figures.

Vote Leave is claiming today that the UK could have to pay an extra £2.4bn into the EU budget to help pay for a “black hole” that has emerged in the accounts. (See 9.16am.)

Full Fact, the fact checking website, has looked at this and concluded that Vote Leave is wrong. It says:

In December 2014, the EU did owe £19.4bn in payments to support poorer regions. But the UK won’t be forced to make any additional payments beyond its regular contribution to the EU budget.

The full analysis is here.

UPDATE: Full Fact’s statement originally said the amount owed was less than £19.4bn, because a reduction had been negotiated, but following clarification from the European commission it now says the full £19.4bn will be paid. I have removed a sentence from the quote above in the light of that clarification. But the key point - that the UK won’t be forced to make additional payments - still applies.

Updated

The Loughborough University Centre for Research in Communication and Culture has published its latest analysis of EU referendum reporting. As it explains in its news release, it found that Labour is being “practically ignored”.

Labour voices are present in less than 4% of TV coverage and just 8% of print coverage of the referendum, and no labour politicians are amongst the top 10 most frequently reported individuals.

The party’s media presence in this latest period of analysis (19 May to 1 June 2016) is even lower than the first phase of the study (6-18 May), with the already low number of television appearances dropping by over 40%.

Professor James Stanyer, the report’s co-author, said:

Labour is almost invisible in the UK media coverage of the EU referendum. This is in part due to the dominance of the Conservative ‘blue on blue’ conflict, but will also be down to Jeremy Corbyn’s reluctance to share a platform with the Tories.

With many believing it will be the Labour voters who ultimately decide the vote on the 23rd, their party’s lack of visibility across press and television will be a major concern.

Here is Alistair Darling, the former Labour chancellor, commenting on the IFS statement. He made his statement in a press notice issued by Britain Stronger in Europe.

This unprecedented intervention from one of the country’s most respected economic experts shows that the Leave campaign do not have a credible economic plan for Britain’s future.

The IFS are clear – leaving the EU’s Single Market would leave us spending less on public services such as the NHS, or taxing more, or borrowing more.

IFS says Gove was wrong to claim leaving EU would free up more money for NHS

In his Sky News interview with Faisal Islam on Friday, Michael Gove, the justice secretary, claimed that the Institute for Fiscal Studies has backed claims that leaving the EU could free up more money for the NHS. Gove said:

There are billions of pounds that we send to the European Union every year and the Institute for Fiscal Studies has pointed out that if we took that money back we could spend it on our NHS.

Today, in response to questions about this from journalist, the IFS has put a short statement on its website saying Gove was misrepresenting its analysis. It says:

Michael Gove claimed on Friday that the IFS had said that leaving the EU would free up £8bn to spend on the NHS. We have not said that. We have looked carefully at the likely public finance implications. We conclude that the net UK contribution to the EU over the next few years is indeed likely to be about £8bn a year, £8bn which would become available for other things were we to leave. However we also point out that even a small negative effect of just 0.6% on national income from leaving the EU would damage the public finances by more than that £8bn. There is virtual unanimity among economic forecasters that the negative economic effect of leaving the EU would be greater than that. That is why we conclude that leaving the EU would not, as Michael Gove claims we said, leave more money to spend on the NHS. Rather it would leave us spending less on public services, or taxing more, or borrowing more.

(Late) lunchtime summary

  • Boris Johnson, the Tory MP and lead figure in the Vote Leave campaign, has said that Britain’s economic success depends upon regaining democratic control. Recently Vote Leave has been accused of focusing on immigration because, with expert opinion almost unanimous about Brexit having a negative impact on growth, at least in the short term, it has been claimed that Leave has lost the argument on the economy. But, at an event in Stratford-upon-Avon also attended by Michael Gove, Gisela Stuart and John Longworth, Johnson insisted that economic success depended on the UK having democratic control of its own affairs. He said:

People are trying to sell it in terms of sales of two rival products. They want to say that we are selling democracy - because that’s what we believe in - and they say that they are selling economics, because they think they have the stronger hand there. That is basically because on the Remain side of the argument, they totally get that we are winning all the democratic points. What they say is that that sacrifice of democracy is worth it for the economic gain.

What I want to say to you today is that that argument is morally and practically and completely wrong, and that democracy is in fact the vital ingredient of economic success. It is irreplaceable and we need to restore it because it is the absence of democratic control that is having all sorts of disastrous consequences for Britain and for the whole of the EU.

The risks of remaining in this over-centralising, over-regulating, job-destroying machine are becoming more and more obvious, and that’s why I think that we are winning the arguments today and that is why we are hearing quite so much rattling from the other side.

From left: Gisela Stuart, John Longworth, Michael Gove MP and Boris Johnson at the Vote Leave event.
From left: Gisela Stuart, John Longworth, Michael Gove MP and Boris Johnson at the Vote Leave event. Photograph: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images
Brexit would put a bomb under UK economy, says Cameron
  • Johnson has conceded that the pound could go down if Britain leaves the EU. Speaking at the Vote Leave event where he was asked about the fact the pound fell this morning following the publication of a poll suggesting Leave has a four-point lead, he said:

The pound will go where it will over the short term. But, believe me, in the long term you can look forward to fantastic success for this country. I think the pound’s value will depend entirely on the strength of the UK economy.

  • Cameron has rejected a claim from Vote Leave that Britain faces a “triple whammy of woe” if it stays in the EU because it will have to increase its contributions to the EU budget. Johnson used the phrase in comments released to the press in advance (see 9.16am) although by the time he came to deliver his speech that actual phrase had been dropped. Cameron said Vote Leave was wrong to say Britain would have to pay more. He told journalists:

I negotiated for the first time a reduction in the European Union spending, not just over one year but over six years. The amount being spent on the budget is coming down, not up. Anything the European Union spends has to be within the ceiling of the budget commitment that I negotiated ...

Our rebate is something that can only be given away if the British prime minister agrees. I can only be changed by unanimity.

But Johnson said in practice the UK would end up paying more into the EU budget if it stayed, not least because there was a £20bn black hole in the budget which would require Britain to contribute an extra £2.4bn. He told journalists:

As far as I can see under article 122 of the treaty, there is absolutely no way that we will be able in the future to be able to insulate ourselves from such calls on the British taxpayer.

When you look at the deficits in the southern regions of the EU, when you look at the budgetary problems they have got, there is no doubt in my mind, as they go forward trying to keep this thing together, they are going to be calling on all EU members to try to do that and they have solid treaty basis upon which to do so.

The idea that the opt-out [the opt-out Cameron negotiated, saying the UK would not have to contribute to future eurozone bailouts] it somehow going to protect us - it has no legal basis at the moment, it is not in the treaty, and you saw what happened to the Danish opt-outs in 1992; they can be simply overridden by the European court. And you have seen the way the commission treats us. I’m afraid I place very little faith in those assurances. I think people should realise that as the euro continues to have problems, there is no way that remaining within the EU that we can insulate ourselves, either from the migration flows or from the cost of keeping it going.

  • Cameron has criticised Michael Gove for dismissing the views of experts. In an interview with Jeremy Vine on Radio 2, Cameron said:

People saying, as some of the Leave campaign did the other day, “I’m fed up of hearing from experts” - Would you build a bridge without listening to expert engineers or architects?

Cameron was referring to what Gove said on Sky News on Friday. Gove told Sky’s Faisal Islam.

I think the people of this country have had enough of experts from organisations with acronyms saying that they know what is best and getting it consistently wrong.

But at the Vote Leave event today Gove was happy to quote “experts” who have said Schengen is a security risk. He told journalists:

On the fact about Schengen and terrorism, I was quoting Ronald Noble, who was the head of Interpol, and it is a view that is reinforced by Richard Dearlove, who used to be in charge of MI6, and Mike Hayden, who was in charge of the CIA - three key experts in dealing with terrorism, all of whom say that the borderless Schengen area facilitates the work of terrorists.

(To be fair, on Sky News Gove was talking about economists. Perhaps he only disapproves of economic experts, not security ones.)

David Cameron listening to Harriet Harman speak at the Britain Stronger in Europe event.
David Cameron listening to Harriet Harman speak at the Britain Stronger in Europe event. Photograph: WILL OLIVER/POOL/EPA
  • Gove has described the European court of justice as a “rogue court” with a political agenda. He told the Vote Leave event:

Even more important than avoiding future dangers is countering the dangers which are clear and present. And That means freeing ourselves from the rogue European court of justice.

The European Court of Justice isn’t a normal court of the kind we in Britain understand. It’s not overseen by independent judges who are there to interpret and enforce laws agreed by a democratically elected legislature.

It’s a court with a fundamentally political agenda. And that is to further the the cause of European integration, no matter what the people think.

  • Tim Roache, the GMB general secretary, has rejected claims that he made a sexist comment about the employment minister and Brexit campaigner Priti Patel. Speaking at the GMB’s annual conference, he mentioned her and said: “Surely a contradiction in a name.” The Tory MP and Vote Leave board member Anne-Marie Trevelyan said this abuse represented a “new low” in the campaign. But Roache said people should have listened to the context of his remarks, saying it was what the minister said about workers’ rights which was not pretty.
  • Natalie Bennett, the Green party leader, has urged journalists to focus more on the referendum issues, and less on Tory and Labour party splits. In unscripted remarks at the end of the Britain Stronger in Europe event she said:

I would like to issue a challenge to the media: please start covering this referendum campaign rather than treating it as a Tory leadership contest.

Updated

Nicola Sturgeon, the SNP leader and Scottish first minister, has been tweeting about her reasons for supporting Remain. She will be one of three politicians arguing for Remain in the ITV debate on Thursday.

Q: Aren’t you encouraging hatred and bigotry?

Farage says the political class has lied to people about Europe for 40 years. He says Anna Soubry, a business minister, recently said trade with the EU could dry up if the UK left the EU. That’s rubbish, he says. Just go to the supermarket this afternoon and look at all the goods from the EU on sale, he says.

And that’s it. Referendum call with Farage is over.

Updated

Q: If an EU army is formed, will our army and nuclear weapons be included?

Farage says if he could prove that, he would win the referendum easily. But he says that two years ago when he debated Nick Clegg, Clegg says Farage was a fantasist because he warned about this. But now it is happening. They are due to discuss it after the referendum. Jean-Claude Juncker has said he wants one.

Q: But the UK could veto it.

No, says Farage. Under enhanced cooperation rules the UK could not veto this.

Farage says, even if we went back to having to pay tariffs to trade with the EU, those tariffs would be so low that the savings from not having to contribute to the EU’s budget would compensate.

Farage says he is bored with hearing people say the EU needs to be reformed. The constitutional convention was supposed to achieve this. One of the debates was about whether it should be democratised. But that option was utterly rejected, he says.

  • Farage says EU rejected opportunity to reform and democratise with the constitutional convention.

Q: [From a Cornish fisherman] Would we get back control of our water?

Yes, says Farage. He says he attended a meeting recently with Norwegian fishermen. Their fishing waters extend for 200 miles, and their fishing industry is booming, he says.

He says he is a fisherman himself. But if he catches a sea bass, he is not allowed to take it home under EU laws, he says.

Q: If we bring in visas for EU citizens, they will retaliate, won’t they? For a family of four, going to Spain could cost £150.

Farage says he does not seen any need for visas for travel or holidays. But he does see the need for work permits.

He says the British spend a lot of money in Spain and France. They were not going to want to put a barrier in the way of Britons coming, he says.

Q: Would there be a border between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic?

No, says Farage. He says the Republic was sensible enough not to join the Schengen area.

Q: So how would you stop EU citizens coming to Ireland, and then travelling to Northern Ireland?

Farage says that is something you would have to keep an eye on.

Q: Will Britain have a veto on Turkey joining the EU?

Farage says Cameron has said he wants Turkey to join the EU. He has got a veto. But it is not one he would ever use.

Q: [From a woman living in France] What compensation will people like us get if we lose our pensions and free health care if the UK leaves the EU?

Farage says the caller has been influenced by a scare campaign. He says the UK government pays the woman’s pension, so that will not be affected. And she will still get health care provided the UK continues to pay, as it does now. That will not change.

  • Farage says expats living on the continent will not lose free health care if UK leaves the EU.

Updated

Nigel Farage on World at One's Referendum Call

Nigel Farage, the Ukip leader, is on the the World at One’s referendum call now.

He says even if the EU does not offer the UK a trade deal, the UK would still be better off out.

Q: But all the experts say we would be better off in.

Farage says there is something called groupthink out there. Organisations that are similar often think the same. They said we should join the euro, and that would have been a mistake. We should ignore them now.

Martin Lewis, who founded the MoneySavingExpert.com website, has just been on the World at One. He said that he personally was backing Remain because he is risk averse, and he thinks Brexit is the riskier option. But other people will take a different approach to risk and may want to vote differently, he said.

He said there were more shades of grey here than on EL James’s bookshelf.

This morning David Cameron tweeted a link to an article by Lewis explaining his position.

Here is an extract from Lewis’s blog.

I’m generally risk-averse, and that pushes me just towards an IN vote for safety, maybe 55% to 45%. Yet just as my dream holiday isn’t necessarily yours, no more is my choice of what’s right a call for you to follow me.

Updated

Osborne says Brexit would lead to border controls coming back in Northern Ireland

George Osborne with local Remain in the EU campaigners in Belfast.
George Osborne with local Remain in the EU campaigners in Belfast.
 Photograph: Clodagh Kilcoyne/Reuters

George Osborne, the chancellor, has been in Northern Ireland today campaign for Britain to remain in the EU. He went to Warrenpoint Port in Co Down, which is a stone’s throw from the Irish Republic, to warn about the implications of Brexit. Pointing to the Carlingford Lough waterway which separates the two countries, he said:

Let’s be clear, if we quit the EU then this is going to be the border with the European Union.

And all the things that those that want to quit the EU claim would happen - ie new immigration checkpoints, border controls and an end to free movement - that has a real consequence, and there would have to be a real hardening of the border imposed either by the British government or indeed by the Irish government ...

I was just talking to a guy who drives a truck - he remembers when it used to take two hours to get across the border and, as a result, business wouldn’t come here, jobs wouldn’t come here, people would trade directly with the Republic.

Leave campaigners in Northern Ireland, who include the Northern Ireland secretary Theresa Villiers, reject claims that Brexit would lead to border controls being re-imposed between Northern Ireland and the Republic.

George Osborne (right) meets workers during a visit to Warrenpoint Harbour in Co Down.
George Osborne (right) meets workers during a visit to Warrenpoint Harbour in Co Down. Photograph: Brian Lawless/PA

Here’s a Guardian video about trying to get young people in Tower Hamlets to take an interest in the EU referendum.

Do young people care about voting in the EU referendum?

Cabinet cancelled this week, No 10 says

Downing Street has confirmed there will be no cabinet tomorrow and cannot say whether there will be one next week. No reason has been given, but it may be a sign that relations have degenerated too badly for senior Conservatives to sit round the same table. Or Cameron may just feel that he and other cabinet ministers cannot save the time now the polls appear to be so tight in the EU referendum.

Vine plays Cameron a clip of a woman saying she wants to partly come out of the EU, but to stay in bits of it.

Cameron says he has some sympathy for her. He says Britain has a special status now, in the EU, but not in the euro or the Schengen area, he says.

And that’s it. The Vine interview is over.

Q: Staying in the EU won’t help us control immigration.

Cameron says leaving the EU would wreck the economy.

What the Leave campaign are saying about immigration is wrong, reckless and misleading.

Q: Staying in will not allow us to control immigration.

Cameron says the new benefit rules will help.

But what Leave are saying is wrong. They say Turkey is joining the EU. No serious person thinks Turkey will join the EU for decades.

Q: What about the 1m refugees in Germany. When they get travel rights, they will be able to come to the UK.

Cameron says when they get travel rights, they won’t be able to come to the UK. History suggests only about 1 or 2% will get German citizenship.

Q: Anna Soubry, the trade minister, said exports to the continent would fall to almost zero if we left the EU.

Cameron says it would all depend what trade deal we had with the EU.

If we went to a World Trade Organisation arrangements, then cars being sold to the EU would face 10 tariffs.

Q: You keep suggesting we would slide into oblivion if we left. But what did you say in the election; Britain was a country willing to take a punt, take a risk.

Cameron accepts Britain could manage outside the UK.

But he says the “British way” is to make organisations like the EU work for us, he says.

Cameron rejects claims Remain camp are 'scaremongering'

Cameron says he does not accept his side is scaremongering.

Instead, there is a “legitimate raising of risks”, he says.

Cameron criticises Gove for dismissing the views of experts

Cameron says organisations like the IMF and OECD are actually paid to warn governments of economic risks.

He says someone from Leave said the other day it was wrong to trust experts. (He is talking about Michael Gove.) But you would not build a bridge without listening to experts, he says.

Q: Experts built the Titanic.

That’s right, says Cameron. But he says on this there is a consensus amongst experts.

  • Cameron criticises Gove for dismissing the views of experts.

Cameron on Radio 2's Jeremy Vine show

David Cameron is now being interview by Jeremy Vine on Radio 2.

Q: Do you agree with what Sir John Major said about Boris Johnson?

Cameron says that Major spoke for himself. Cameron says he has taken a self-denying ordinance (not to criticise fellow Tories, he implies.)

Q: Leave has taken the lead in polls, and the pound has crashed in value. Doesn’t that show that Cameron is right to say Leave is a threat to the economy.

Johnson says the value of the pound depends on the strength of the economy, and the economy will be stronger outside the EU. In the short term it can go where it wants. In the long term Britain will prosper, he says.

And that’s it. The Vote Leave event is over.

Q: [From my colleague Anushka Asthana] Cameron says your policies would be like putting a bomb under the economy. Are you worried by the language being used. And what would be the impact on the economy of cutting immigration.

On the first point, Gove says they all believe in free speech. People can say what they like.

On the second point, Johnson says the key thing is to have an immigration system that is controlled. But people who are talented should still be able to come to the UK, he says.

At the moment politicians cannot keep the promises they make on immigration.

Stuart says the current system discriminates against workers from outside the EU.

Longworth says we have the worst of both words. Unlimited immigration from the EU drives down wages, drives down skills and drives down productivity, he says. It means employers have no incentive to train workers. So the economy needs more skilled workers from abroad. But it is harder to get them from outside the EU, he says.

Gove cites three key experts who say there is a real risk of remaining in the EU.

As the Labour peer Stewart Wood points out, this contrasts with the approach he took in the Sky News event on Friday.

Johnson denies lying about UK having to pay more to EU if it stays

Q: [From the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg] Aren’t you selling out the truth? You says we will be forced to pay more to the EU. But you know the PM has done deals to stop the UK having to pay for eurzone bailouts.

Johnson says there is a black hole in the EU budgets, which means the UK will have to pay £2.4bn more.

If we remain in the EU, there is no way we can insulate ourselves from further costs.

  • Johnson denies lying about UK having to pay more to EU if it stays.

Updated

Vote Leave Q&A

The panel are now taking questions, from journalists and from workers at the warehouse.

Q: [From a worker] If we leave the EU, will EU migrants working here have to leave?

Stuart says she (a German) is not going anywhere, and EU citizens working here will not have to leave either. She says it is irresponsible to suggest otherwise.

Johnson says the UK gave up its veto over further eurozone integration as part of David Cameron’s EU renegotiation.

If the UK stays in the EU, there is nothing we can do to protect this country from the biggest social change seen for a century - mass immigration, partly prompted by economic problems in the EU.

He says the Remain campaign have not set out their plan for how Britain can cope with rising immigration.

He says the Leave campaign have a solution: take back control.

It is a delusion to think we can gain greater prosperity by bartering away our freedom and our democracy.

He says around the world no other group of countries are doing what the EU is doing - creating a centralised union.

So the risk of remaining are becoming more and more obvious, he says.

That is why we are winning the arguments today, he says.

Johnson says UK cannot have economic success without democratic control

Boris Johnson is speaking now.

He says they are at a warehouse distributing cleaning products. No one can say they are not running a clean campaign, he jokes.

He says the Vote Leave campaign are winning all the democratic arguments. Does anyone know the name of their MEP? I rest my case, he says.

He says people can see that it is wrong that 60% of laws going through Westminster originate from Brussels.

He says only 3.6% of European commission officials are British. Britain has been outvoted more than any other country, he says.

He says Remain are arguing that it is worth sacrificing democracy for economic gain. But he says he will argue today that democracy is essential for economic success.

Boris Johnson.
Boris Johnson. Photograph: Reuters

Michael Gove is speaking now.

He says the EU was formed for idealistic reason. He admires those reasons, he says.

But he says now it is undermining the UK’s security.

He says the Schengen zone helps terrorists move around Europe. That is not just his view, he says. It is the view of Ronald Noble, the former head of Interpol, he says.

He says the EU wants to create a European army.

And he says the EU is undermining Nato.

He also says we need to free ourselves from “the rogue European court of justice”. It is not like a normal court, overseen by independent judges. It is a court with a political agenda that can overrule parliament, he says.

He says, if anything, it is likely to over-rule parliament more often in the future.

Michael Gove.
Michael Gove. Photograph: Reuters

Longworth says companies like the EU because it is a source of cheap labour.

He says the single market is a “protectionist customs union”. We are better off out of it, he says.

John Longworth.
John Longworth. Photograph: Reuters

John Longworth, the former director general of the British Chambers of Commerce, is speaking now.

He says the EU works in the interests of Germany. If the UK stays in, Germany will benefit, he says.

Alternatively, the eurozone could explode, he says.

Believe me - you don’t want to be in the room when that bomb goes off.

Vote Leave event.
Vote Leave event. Photograph: Reuters

There is a live feed of the event at the top of the blog.

Gisela Stuart, the Labour MP, is speaking now. She says she is an immigrant. She is a beneficiary of an open system. But it is not right to have a system where politicians do not have control over their borders, she says.

This is from the Telegraph’s Michael Deacon.

Vote Leave event

The Vote Leave event is just starting. It’s in Stratford-upon-Avon, and the speakers are Boris Johnson, Gisela Stuart, Michael Gove and John Longworth.

Here is the 38-page Britain Stronger in Europe dossier (pdf) that David Cameron was talking about earlier. It supposedly describes “four con tricks” Vote Leave are perpetrating.

Vote Leave accuses Cameron of campaigning alongside 'losers'

Here are some of the tweets Vote Leave have been posting in response to the Cameron/Harman/Farron/Bennett event.

The event is over. The Reuters feed shows Cameron hurrying off. He is not hanging around to gossip with Harman, Farron or Bennett.

It would have looked a bit more genuinely cross-party if Cameron had let Harman, Farron and Bennett answer some of the questions in the Q&A.

Still, it was a probably effective campaign event. People generally like seeing politicians from different parties cooperating. It makes them look public-spirited.

David Cameron speaking at a Britain Stronger in Europe event, with Harriet Harman waiting to follow him.
David Cameron speaking at a Britain Stronger in Europe event, with Harriet Harman waiting to follow him. Photograph: WPA Pool/Getty Images

Cameron winds up the event.

But Natalie Bennett comes forward. She says all the questions were about party splits. She urges the media to focus on the issues, and not on what is happening to the Tory party or the Labour party.

Q: [From ITV’s Robert Peston] Isn’t Boris Johnson right to say what we pay to the EU will go up? The Labour leader isn’t here? Doesn’t that mean Labour is not committed to Remain?

Cameron says Labour is officially committed to remaining in the EU. He would be happy to share a platform with Jeremy Corbyn, he says.

He says it has been shown “beyond any doubt” that the figure on the Vote Leave bus is misleading. He says even Nigel Farage says it is misleading.

Cameron says he negotiated a reduction in the EU budget for the rest of this decade.

He says the rebate can only be changed by unanimity - ie, if the British prime minister agrees.

He says Vote Leave are “reckless with statistics and wrong on the figures”.

Q: [From Andy Bell, 5 News] Isn’t the case for Remain being lost in the Tory civil war? And what will you do to end it?

Cameron says he is going to focus on the facts. Today we have seen a broad alliance. People who would not normally be seen together, “be seen dead together on a platform”, all making the case for Remain.

The Leave campaign are being reckless.

They are going around the country telling people things that simply are not true, he says.

Cameron's Q&A

The speeches are over.

Cameron says they will take some questions.

Q: [From Alex Forsyth, BBC] Isn’t the fact you have to line up with Labour and the Lib Dems and the Greens a sign of the disunity in your party?

Cameron says there is an “extraordinarily broad alliance” in favour of Remain. The four speakers have put a broad range of arguments, he says. People want to know the arguments and the facts.

Natalie Bennett, the Green party leader, is speaking now.

She says she wants to focus today on the environmental case for staying in the EU.

The environment doesn’t respect national borders. Birds migrate. Fish cross seas. Rivers merge. Oceans meet. Air pollution drifts. Natural resources are shared. Acid rain pours on everyone – not just the country responsible for the pollution. What one country does to its own environment can profoundly affect its neighbours – and those far beyond it. Some people think of environmental threats as a concern only for the few – but they matter to everyone. Take air pollution as just one example - it kills thousands every year and particularly affects the poorest, the oldest and the least healthy – It is an issue of inequality as much as it is of environmental protection.

And we know that action on the biggest threats to our environment can’t just be conducted from our own island – it has to be done internationally. And it is. Over the years, European Union membership has helped transform the UK’s natural environment.

Natalie Bennett.
Natalie Bennett. Photograph: Reuters

Updated

Harman challenges Vote Leave to say what workers' rights they would cut

Harriet Harman is speaking now.

She says she wants people to know where Labour stands.

It’s not surprising that Labour supporters have struggled to catch a glimpse of why Labour backs the EU as the media has been dominated by the row in the Tory party.

She says the EU protects workers’ rights.

Because we’re in the EU, people have better rights at work. The EU guarantees those rights. It’s the EU that made our governments pass laws to ensure employers give paid holiday, paid maternity leave, rights for part-timers. So long as we’re in the EU no Tory government can try and take those rights away.

And she says the Remain campaign is right to warn people about the threat to workers’ rights.

I’m not going to be put off by people calling it “Project Fear”. I am fearful about jobs, and women’s rights at work, and I make no bones about it.

The leaders of the campaign that wants us to leave the EU say that they can’t guarantee that people wouldn’t lose their jobs - but it’s a risk worth taking. But it’s not their jobs at risk. We need more jobs not fewer. Let’s not make getting a job harder.

And I’m fearful about our rights at work - and with good reason. Look at the leaders of the leave campaign. They never fought for your rights at work - they’ve fought against them. They say they want to get rid of the “social chapter” and cut “red tape” and scrap regulation. That’s your right to paid holiday they’re talking about, your maternity leave, your paternity pay. We need better rights at work, not to have to start fighting to defend the rights that we already have.

So I challenge them today - you’ve said you want to “cut red tape” and scrap “£600m of regulation. Don’t speak in code. Be honest about it. Admit that means you would abolish the rights to maternity leave and paternity leave, scrap the laws that stop employers treating part-timers as second class citizens and which make employers pay for holiday leave.

And she says people should not blame immigrants for the state of the NHS.

Immigration is a big issue so I want to put out some facts. There’s more immigration from outside the EU than people coming from other EU countries.

If you’re worried about the NHS - don’t blame immigrants. The person from Ireland, or Spain or Portugal is more likely to be the nurse at your bedside than queuing in A and E. So don’t blame the EU for problems in the NHS - that’s down to the government.

Farron says the Vote Leave campaign has been particularly dishonest on the subject of public spending.

Their big red bus says you can save £350m a week, and then spend it all on the NHS. A complete con. And they’re still driving it round despite the figure being rubbished by every economist under the sun.

And it’s not just the NHS this made-up, magic money is spent on. This dossier shows they have made two dozen different spending commitments.

Want more money for schools? You got it. Roads, railways, houses. Yep. Do you want to pay junior doctors more, increase welfare spending and slash the deficit all in one go? Of course you do.

You can even have more submarines if that is your thing.

How about abolishing prescription charges? Cutting your council tax by more than half? Slashing VAT – and your energy bills too while they’re at it.

They have even said they’d spend millions and millions filling in Britain’s potholes.

All of which sounds very tempting, especially that last one - filling in potholes is a cause very close to every Liberal Democrat’s heart.

But, if you add all these things up, it would cost £113bn.

One hundred and thirteen billion pounds.

He says there was a particularly strong example of Vote Leave’s dishonesty at the weekend.

Another clear as day example of one of their cons was just this week. On Saturday, they said by 2020, we can give the NHS a £100 million per week cash injection. On Sunday, they said we wouldn’t leave the EU until after 2020. So where would this magic money come from? They are literally making it up as they go along, trying to con the British public along the way.

Tim Farron says Vote Leave campaign is 'based on lies'

Tim Farron, the Lib Dem leader, is speaking now.

He says he wants to put a positive case for the EU, but it is important to say that the Vote Leave case is based on lies, he says.

I believe in the positive case for Europe. But I cannot stand back and allow the leave campaign to guide us towards economic ruin, because of a campaign based on lies.

How betrayed will people feel if they vote to leave Europe based on the reasons presented by the Leave Campaign, only to see in the weeks, months and years that follow that those reasons were utter, invented rubbish.

Tim Farron
Tim Farron. Photograph: Reuters

Cameron says leaving the EU would 'put a bomb under our economy'

Cameron says Vote Leave have not explained what terms of access the UK would have to the EU market if it left.

They have offered many different models, he says.

He says leaving the EU would generate three effects.

One: there would be an immediate shock effect.

Almost everyone now agrees, from the Governor of the Bank of England to the IMF, the OECD to the Treasury, 9 in 10 economists to, yes, even some Leave campaigners, there would be an economic shock if we left Europe.

Let’s be clear what that means:

The pound falling; prices rising; house prices collapsing; mortgage rates increasing; businesses going bust; and unemployment going up.

In other words: a recession.

Two: there would be an uncertainty effect.

We’d have to renegotiate our relationship with 27 other EU countries…

…and with 53 countries and territories with whom we have deals through the EU.

Given that it took Greenland 3 years – and they just sell fish...

…and Canada 7 years – and they haven’t even finished…

…we’d face a decade of uncertainty.

There’s nothing the people who create our jobs and grow our economy hate more.

And think about it for someone starting out. Leaving school. Beginning that apprenticeship. Looking forward to graduating.

Do we want those young people, the future of our country, to face a decade of uncertainty?

Three: there’d be a trade effect.

Nearly half of what we sell goes to Europe.

And, with a worse deal, in the long term our trade would shrink and become more expensive.

Think of the impact on BMW, for example. 80 per cent of Minis are exported.

Think of the wider impact: fewer businesses, fewer jobs, a smaller economy and less money for our schools and hospitals.

Add those things together – the shock impact, the uncertainty impact, the trade impact – and you put a bomb under our economy.

And the worst thing is we’d have lit the fuse ourselves.

Cameron says Vote Leave's failure to set out economic vision is 'undemocratic' and 'reckless'

David Cameron is speaking at the Britain Stronger in Europe event.

He says Britiain will be stronger if it stays in the EU.

And he challenges Vote Leave to explain what would happen if Britain left.

By failing to set out an economic plan, they are being “undemocratic” and “reckless” he says.

He says the British economy is slowing because of the uncertainty facing the UK.

He says today Britain Stronger in Europe is publishing a document highlighting the inconsistencies in the Vote Leave case.

Here is the scene where David Cameron is about to share a platform with Harriet Harman, the former Labour deputy leader, Tim Farron, the Lib Dem leader, and Natalie Bennett, the Green leader, to make the case for staying in the EU.

Britain Stronger in Europe event
Britain Stronger in Europe event. Photograph: Reuters

Here are the YouGov tables with full details of their poll (pdf).

Leanne Wood, leader of Plaid Cymru, has urged young people to make sure they are registered to vote before tomorrow, the final day for registration. She said:

The younger generation have most at stake in this referendum. It is today’s eighteen year olds and twenty-somethings who will live with the legacy of the outcome longer than any of us older people. To all of you - I urge you not to let others determine your future.

The fact that you can travel freely throughout the European Union to learn, to explore and broaden your horizons is cause for celebration.

There are numerous EU safeguards - from employment rights, to human rights, women’s rights, environmental protections. Do we trust Westminster and especially the Tories in Westminster to protect these and act in Wales’s best interests?

Leanne Wood.
Leanne Wood. Photograph: Adrian Sherratt for the Guardian

TNS has sent out more details of its poll. As Luke Taylor, head of social and political attitudes at TNS UK explains, the headline figures (Leave 43%, Remain 41%) only give Leave a lead because of the way the results have been weighted according to likelihood to turn out.

With the referendum less than a month away, we are now adjusting the voting intention for differential turnout. The support for ‘Remain’ looks to be softer than the support for ‘Leave’ and without this adjustment ‘Remain’ would have a three point lead over ‘Leave’. Whether or not ‘Remain’ supporters turn out will therefore be critical in the outcome.

Updated

Johnson claims UK face 'triple whammy of woe' if it stays in UK - but Cameron says he's wrong

Boris Johnson has coined the most colourful soundbite of the morning. According to the Daily Telegraph, he is going to claim in his speech today that taxpayers face “a triple whammy of woe” if they stay in the EU.

The risks of remain are massive. Not only do we hand over more than £350 million a week to the EU, but if we vote to stay the British people will be on the hook for even more cash. It is a triple whammy of woe: the eurozone is being strangled by stagnation, unemployment and a lack of growth, it could explode at any time and we will be forced to bail it out.

The botched bureaucratic response to the migration crisis means the Eurocrats are demanding even more of our money. And now we find that there is a £20 billion black hole in the EU’s finances.

Vote Leave is claiming that unmet costs in the EU’s budget could mean the UK having to contribute an extra £2.4bn. The other two “whammies” are supposed extra contributions because of the immigration crisis, and supposed contributions to future eurozone bailouts.

As Claire reported earlier, Cameron has used Twitter to say that Johnson’s claims are “simply wrong”. (See 8.33am.)

Pounds falls in value as poll shows Leave four points ahead

Good morning. I’m Andrew Sparrow, taking over from Claire.

There are two polls out this morning showing Leave ahead.

As Claire reported earlier, a YouGov poll for ITV’s Good Morning Britain puts Leave four-points ahead.

This is from the LSE’s Simon Hix.

There is also a TNS poll putting Leave two-points ahead, although this also shows the Leave lead going down.

As we have been reporting on the business blog, the pound fell first thing this morning on the back of these polls.

I’m now handing over the live blog to Andrew Sparrow, who’ll take you through the rest of the day. Thanks for reading and for the tweets and comments.

David Cameron has taken to Twitter – as I believe journalists are obliged to describe it – to knock back claims by Vote Leave that Britain would be liable for a £2.4bn bill to the EU in the event of a win for Remain.

A BBC reality check – admittedly on the subject of bailouts more widely, rather than the specific £2.4bn claim – came to the same conclusion as the PM:

The UK will not pay for future eurozone bailouts. This has already been agreed by EU leaders. In addition, the UK-EU deal from February, which will be implemented if the UK votes to stay in the EU, reinforces this and states that the UK would be reimbursed if the general EU budget is used for the cost of the eurozone crisis.

Over on the business desk, my colleague Graeme Wearden is live blogging developments as the pounds slides following the poll boost for Brexit:

The pound is sliding this morning after a string of opinion polls gave the Brexit campaign a lead in the 23 June EU referendum.

Sterling tumbled in early trading, shedding more than 1.5 cents against the US dollar. It has hit a three-week low of $1.4355, down 1.1%.

It is also losing ground against other developed currencies. Against the euro, the pound is down 1 eurocent at €1.2661.

Traders are reacting to yesterday’s Observer/Opinium poll, which gave the Brexit campaign a three percentage point lead. And aYouGov poll for ITV’s Good Morning Britain has put Leave in front on 45% and Remain on 41%.

Many analysts have predicted that the pound would tumble if Britain voted to leave the EU, possibly as low as $1.20 against the US dollar.

Robert Hutton at Bloomberg has bravely taken a look at what the polling in this referendum campaign might mean – or not mean – given the polling blip in the run-up to the Scottish referendum, and the wide-of-the-mark statistics that marked last year’s general election. Should we ignore the polls? Or if not, how much salt do we need to be pinching?

In any case, this quote by Joe Twyman, head of political polling at YouGov, has a ring of truth:

There’s a discrepancy in levels of motivation. There are millions of people who would walk barefoot across broken glass to vote to leave.

The Remain campaign doesn’t have people who feel the same way.

After last week’s debate-separated-by-24-hours, in which Cameron and Gove endured separate grillings on Sky News, this week sees a similar set-up as the prime minister definitely does not face off with Nigel Farage in an ITV Q&A.

Screened live on ITV1 on Tuesday at 9pm, Cameron and Farage will appear individually in front of a studio audience of 200 people for 30 minutes of questions, moderated by Julie Etchingham.

Later this week, ITV also hosts a two-hour debate that will actually be a debate, with Remain and Leave candidates on-screen at the same time and even engaging with each other.

Nicola Sturgeon has argued in favour of the benefits of the EU for working people, women and young people.
Nicola Sturgeon has argued in favour of the benefits of the EU for working people, women and young people. Photograph: Frank Augstein/AP

SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon will appear for the In campaign, with the Sunday Telegraph reporting that she will be flanked by Conservative minister Amber Rudd and Angela Eagle for Labour.

On the Out side will be Boris Johnson, Andrea Leadsom and Gisela Stuart.

Updated

Ten trade union leaders, including the general secretaries of Unite, Unison, the GMB and Usdaw, have signed a letter to the Guardian today in support of Britain remaining in the EU and calling on their combined 6 million members to vote accordingly.

They say:

After much debate and deliberation we believe that the social and cultural benefits of remaining in the EU far outweigh any advantages of leaving …

Despite words to the contrary from figures like Iain Duncan Smith and Michael Gove, the Tories would negotiate our exit and, we believe, would negotiate away our rights. We simply do not trust this government if they are presented with an unrestricted, unchecked opportunity to attack our current working rights.

Read the letter in full here:

Matthew D’Ancona, in a new Guardian column this morning, says Cameron is wrong to say – as he did to the Mail on Sunday yesterday – that he would not sack Johnson and Gove if Remain wins the referendum:

It is one thing to be a conciliator; quite another to be a pushover. No structure of authority can long survive if there are not clear consequences for transgressions.

Let’s be frank: does Cameron really believe the Brexiteers will be as merciful to him if he loses? The hardcore of backbenchers who loathe him are longing for a confidence vote and a merciless battle to replace him with Johnson as soon as possible. This plan is all but public – demeaningly so for Cameron.

A united party is not one where the leader yields to every demand and forgives every offence. A united party is one where the leader combines breadth of support with a recognition of behavioural limits and the authority to enforce them.

Here’s an intriguing one: the BBC’s James Lansdale reports that a group of pro-EU MPs are investigating whether the House of Commons – which has a majority for Remain – could keep Britain inside the single market even in the event of a vote for Leave:

The BBC has learned pro-Remain MPs would use their voting power in the House of Commons to protect what they see as the economic benefits of a single market, which gives the UK access to 500 million consumers.

Staying inside the single market would mean Britain would have to keep its borders open to EU workers and continue paying into EU coffers.

Ministers have told the BBC they expect pro-EU MPs to conduct what one called a “reverse Maastricht” process – a reference to the long parliamentary campaign fought by Tory eurosceptic MPs in the 1990s against legislation deepening EU integration …

They say it would be legitimate for MPs to push for the UK to stay in the single market because the Leave campaign has refused to spell out what trading relationship it wants the UK to have with the EU in the future.

As such, a post-Brexit government could not claim it had a popular mandate for a particular model.

Read the full BBC article – and quotes from (unnamed) MPs – here.

Morning briefing

Good morning and welcome to the second week of our daily EU referendum coverage.

I’m kicking things off with the morning briefing to set you up for the day ahead and steering the live blog until Andrew Sparrow takes his seat. Do come and chat in the comments below or find me on Twitter @Claire_Phipps.

The big picture

David Cameron might not want to face fellow Conservatives in debates over Britain’s future but today he’ll issue a statement with politicians usually found on the opposite side of the Commons, teaming up with Labour’s Harriet Harman, Lib Dem leader Tim Farron and Green party leader Natalie Bennett to label the Brexit campaign a “con-trick”.

Together they’ll accuse Leave campaigners – including the prime minister’s own party chums Michael Gove and Boris Johnson – of producing “contradictory statements” about Britain’s economic future outside the EU, saying the Brexiteers have put forward 23 different positions on the alternative to the single market.

While it’s all about putting party loyalties aside for the sake of the country for some, for others it’s – as the Telegraph puts it this morning – “ intensify[ing] the Tory civil war”. As Lord Tebbit told the paper:

I think it’s dangerous for the leader of the Conservative party to give greater credence to minor parties such as the Greens and the Lib Dems.

It just makes them look as though they are major political players and as though they are leaders of national parties.

Ouch.

Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron: watch out for burns.
Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron: watch out for burns. Photograph: Murdo Macleod for the Guardian

Jeremy Corbyn, the Labour leader, has said he will not share a platform with Cameron, but rejected criticism that his support for Remain has not been full-throated:

We’re not giving a blank cheque to the EU. We want a Europe where there is solidarity of socialist parties, trade unions, people who want to see a decent society, welfare state, NHS, full employment, decent rights at work.

The chancellor, George Osborne, is on a two-day trip to Belfast and Newry to encourage voters to turn out for Remain in Northern Ireland – reportedly the most pro-EU part of the UK.

The Leave campaign is also out in force again with the by-now familiar cross-party group of Johnson, Gove and Labour MP Gisela Stuart in Stratford-upon-Avon to argue that the UK will face a £2.4bn bill after the referendum to fill a black hole in EU coffers.

Vote Leave says a “backlog of unpaid bills” has left the EU with a £19.4bn debt and that Britain – responsible for 12.57% of the EU budget – would need to cover £2.4bn of that.

Labour’s Chuka Umunna said the claim was “nonsense”:

Our special status in Europe means we are protected from paying in to eurozone bailouts, we have already cut the EU budget and we have a veto over it in future.

Ukip leader Nigel Farage – no cosying up between him and the official Vote Leave campaign – has been interviewed in the FT, and says a Brexit would be just the first step in the disintegration of the entire EU.

You should also know:

Poll position

This morning a YouGov poll for ITV’s Good Morning Britain will put Leave in front on 45% and Remain on 41%, according to overnight reports.

Sunday’s Observer/Opinium poll also registered a nosing-ahead for the Brexit camp, with Leave on 43% and Remain on 40%:

The poll suggests the remain camp has lost four percentage points in the last two weeks, during which Boris Johnson and Michael Gove have relentlessly campaigned on the theme of immigration.

The leave campaign appears to have picked up three percentage points. The potential in the leave campaign’s strategy is reflected in responses suggesting that two in five voters (41%) cite immigration as one of their two most important issues when deciding how to vote … Half of the 2,007 people surveyed said they believed immigration would be under better control if the UK did leave the EU .

A Daily Telegraph survey of 19,000 of its subscribers has found over two-thirds of them (69%) will be voting to leave the EU. And 42% would like to see Leave champion – and Telegraph columnist – Johnson as the next prime minister. Readers’ top concern was not, however, immigration (51% said this was “very important”) but the “sovereignty of the British parliament” (71%).

Diary

You could spend the whole day listening to politicians argue the pros and cons of the EU, if that’s your bag. (And if it is: welcome! You’ll fit right in here.)

Yvette Cooper.
Yvette Cooper.
  • At 9am, Victoria Derbyshire hosts an EU referendum debate in Manchester, broadcast on BBC2 and the BBC News channel. It’s an all-female panel – a rare sighting in the campaign so far – of Labour MP Yvette Cooper, Lib Dem Baroness (Sal) Brinton, Ukip MEP Jane Collins and Conservative MP Suella Fernandes.
  • Labour frontbenchers Angela Eagle and Hilary Benn are going to Vote Leave HQ to petition them over which workers’ rights would be lost in a Brexit.
  • At 9.30am in Looe, Cornwall, former environment secretary Owen Paterson makes a speech on fishing policy and the benefits of Brexit.
  • From 10am in Stratford Upon Avon, Leavers Boris Johnson, Gisela Stuart, Michael Gove and John Longworth – who quit as the director general of the British Chambers of Commerce over his views on the EU – talk about the risks of remaining.
Natalie Bennett.
Natalie Bennett.
  • Meanwhile, David Cameron, Labour’s Harriet Harman, Lib Dem leader Tim Farron and Greens leader Natalie Bennett put the case for staying, in a separate event.
  • At 1pm, Tory MP Julian Brazier and Labour defence shadow Emily Thornberry debate the EU at the Royal United Services Institute.
  • Then at 2.30pm there’s another referendum debate, this time hosted by thinktank ResPublica in London and featuring former Lib Dem leader Lord Ashdown, Labour MP Emma Reynolds, John Longworth (again), Tory MEP Daniel Hannan and others.
  • And at 7.30pm Hilary Benn pops up again, this time to be interviewed by Andrew Neil on BBC1.

Read these

OK, it’s unlikely you’ve not heard Boris Johnson expounding on Brexit, but he’s in the Telegraph today warning that Britain risks “the worst hangover in history” on 24 June:

You were about to strike your own small but vital blow for freedom and democracy – when you suddenly bottled it. You swerved; you shied; you jibbed; you baulked. You screwed up your eyes in the polling booth and you found yourself momentarily oppressed by the sheer weight of the Remain propaganda – all that relentless misery about this country and its inability to stand on its own two feet.

For reasons you secretly know were nonsensical, you decided to go for what the gloom-mongers had told you was the safer option. Nose held, eyes screwed tight, you voted for Remain. And now you understand why you feel that sense of morning-after shame and abject remorse: because the burble from the TV is informing you that Remain have won. Yes, by the narrowest margin you – and fellow last-minute swervers – have helped to keep us locked in the back of the minicab, with a driver who barely speaks English, going in a direction we don’t want to go.

Boris Johnson: worrying about a potential hangover.
Boris Johnson: worrying about a potential hangover. Photograph: John Stillwell/PA

In the Times, Clare Foges, erstwhile speechwriter to David Cameron, reminds us that not everyone knows which way they’ll vote:

As for the Leavers’ economic case, to quote Sarah Palin on Obama, it seems to amount to a lot of ‘hopey changey stuff’. There is a kind of derring-do, Dangerous Book For Boys spirit about Britannia unchained and going it alone. Won’t it be glorious? Yes, well the Charge of the Light Brigade was glorious in its own way.

On Remain-leaning days I fear the country charging into a field of economic disaster, a shredded flag aloft.

An editorial in the Financial Times says businesses need to speak up on the dangers of Brexit:

A wider diversity of pro-EU voices is urgently needed. This places a special responsibility on business leaders. Signing letters about the dangers of Brexit is not enough – every CEO ought to be speaking directly to their employees to spell out the personal consequences of leaving …

The EU referendum has split the Conservative party, polarised the country and stoked anti-establishment politics, but it has also encouraged democratic debate. Politicians must respond with facts and sound arguments. In an age of anti-politician sentiments, it is incumbent on business leaders to speak up, too. There is no more pressing issue for business than the UK’s membership of the EU. To stay silent would be grossly irresponsible.

Baffling claim of the day

Peter Mandelson emerges today to give a speech saying a vote to Remain would see an end to “grandiose, mellifluous bullshit”. While it’s hard to argue against voting for that, one can only assume he’s mixed up the EU with utopia.

Celebrity endorsement of the day

At the South Bank arts awards in London on Sunday evening, Elaine Paige broke with the culture club by saying she was likely to vote to leave the EU:

I’m of the feeling to leave, but I’m probably a minority in the arts when I say that.

The day in a tweet

If today were a nursery rhyme ...

It would be I Can Sing a Rainbow. Red and yellow and pink and green, purple and orange and blue. It might be a Tory civil war, but it looks pretty.

And another thing

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