Summary
Here are the main points from the debate.
- David Cameron said he wanted people to vote for a Great Britain in the EU, not for “the little England of Nigel Farage”.
I hope that when people go to vote on June 23 they think about their children and grandchildren, they think about the jobs and the opportunities they want for them, the sort of country we want to build together and they vote to say ‘we don’t want the little England of Nigel Farage’, we want to be Great Britain and we are great if we stay in these organisations and fight for the values we believe in.
- He said leaving the EU could hasten the break-up of the UK. Previously he has rejected the argument that a vote to leave the EU could justify a second Scottish independence referendum. But tonight he said:
You don’t strengthen your country by leading to its break-up.
- Nigel Farage said it was worth cutting immigration even if that meant lower GDP, because there was more to life than economic growth. He said:
Do you know something? There is more to this country, there is more about this community than just being competitive ... What I’m saying is that it’s wrong, wrong, wrong for average decent people in this country their living standards are falling by about 10%. It’s about time we were not thinking about GDP, the rich getting richer, and think about ordinary decent people who are having a rotten time.
- Cameron said Farage was wrong to dismiss the importance of growth. He said:
Nigel Farage kept on talking about ‘GDP isn’t all that matters’. GDP is the size of our economy. It is the combination of all the wealth our country creates. He is basically saying it doesn’t really matter. He is so keen to get us out of Europe that he is prepared to sacrifice jobs and growth along the way. We mustn’t do that.
- Cameron said that the British were not “quitters”, and that they should stay in the EU.
Leaving is quitting and I don’t think Britain, I don’t think we are quitters, I think we are fighters. We fight in these organisations for what we think is right.
- Cameron refused to say what impact the cuts to migrants’ benefits he agreed as part of his EU renegotiation would have on net migration. Asked about this, he replied:
I haven’t made a forecast, because frankly we have had pretty extraordinary years recently in the EU. The first five years I was prime minister our economy created more jobs than the rest of the EU put together and so we have seen a lot of people coming to live and work here.
- Farage rejected Justin Welby’s claim that his comments about the dangers of Cologne-style attacks on women were racist. Farage said:
I’m used to being demonised ...
I’m not going to stand and attack the archbishop of Canterbury but he would have done better to read what I actually said ... It is a tiddly issue in this campaign. I knew the Remainers would come to me and conflate what I said.
- Farage criticised the pharmaceutical industry. In response to a question from someone who worked in it, he said:
I’m not wholly happy with much of the way the pharmaceutical industry has behaved, in particular I see their lobbying in Brussels which is absolutely massive and I see the way they have been very good at putting out of business people producing alternative medicine.
- He said members of the establishment often only started criticising economic orthodoxy when they left their jobs.
They have been wrong before and they are wrong again. There are strong, independent voices in business - people like John Longworth from the British Chambers of Commerce, who resigned his position to speak out against this and people like Digby Jones, the former director general of the CBI.
So the trend is, if they are currently in post they support the status quo, once they have retired or resigned - the former governor of the Bank of England Mervyn King - they speak more freely.
- He said he thought the EU would not survive. Asked about what it would be like in the future, he said:
I think it’s done for. The eurozone is a catastrophe. The migrant crisis is dividing not just countries but within countries. The money’s run out and yet they’re saving up for the say after our referendum an announcement about a European army.
A happy Europe will be a democratic Europe of sovereign nations who are good neighbours in the same street.
That’s all from me for tonight.
Thanks for the comments.
Updated
The Telegraph’s Michael Deacon has filed his sketch of the Cameron/Farage programme already. Here’s an excerpt.
Vote Leave believed that Mr Cameron himself had insisted on facing the Ukip leader, rather than Vote Leave’s Boris Johnson, because he thought Mr Farage was a more divisive figure who would be more likely to put off undecided viewers.
In the event, Vote Leave’s fears looked understandable. Mr Farage wasn’t being aggressive, and he was as eloquent as ever – but he was also prickly with paranoia.
Commenting on what Cameron said about Scotland, a spokesman for Farage said:
I cannot believe Nicola Sturgeon is going to have a referendum to give away powers from Holyrood [to the EU]. It ain’t going to work. If you look at the polling in Scotland, there is no real appetite for a second referendum. In a Brexit Britain, Holyrood will get increased powers. They will not go to Westminster, they will go to Holyrood.
Steven Woolfe, Ukip immigration spokesman, said:
What I was surprised by was how weak David Cameron looked. His demeanor, his shoulders, even the way he was looking at the audience, showed this is a man under intense pressure. He couldn’t seem to answer the questions on immigration and was deeply confused about the question on the NHS. He’s doing Britain down when he once said he’d do very well.
Tom Watson, the deputy Labour leader, said Farage “got flustered and hectored the audience” while Cameron made his case convincingly.
Farage had a big job to do and he failed. Cameron did his job adequately. The frustration as Labour politician is that we could not talk about our distinct message on the EU that, yes, it’s a single market but it also offers full workplace protections and we don’t want a race to the bottom on workplace rights. But I guess we couldn’t expect David Cameron to make that case.
Cameron v Farage - Verdict from the Twitter commentariat
This is what political journalists and commentators are saying about the Cameron v Farage contest on Twitter.
Cameron made the best impression, although no one seems carried away with excitement.
From the BBC’s Nick Robinson
My debate verdict : Good for Leave - immigration dominates. Good for Remain - Cameron's passion - "we're fighters not quitters"
— Nick Robinson (@bbcnickrobinson) June 7, 2016
From the Guardian’s Gaby Hinsliff
Tonight we learned that Farage patronises uppity women & Cameron struggles with questions about immigration. Ie nothing we didn't know
— Gaby Hinsliff (@gabyhinsliff) June 7, 2016
From ITV’s Robert Peston
.@David_Cameron polished but for conspicuous failure to say how he would honour promise to cut immigration to tens of thousands #ITVEURef
— Robert Peston (@Peston) June 7, 2016
From the Guardian’s Jonathan Freedland
Fair point from @tombradby and @Peston that Cameron still lacks a knockout answer on immigration. Doesn't dare make a positive case for it
— Jonathan Freedland (@Freedland) June 7, 2016
From the Spectator’s James Forsyth
Cameron looked happy at the end of that, got his choice of opponent and did all he could to take advantage of that mentioning Farage a lot
— James Forsyth (@JGForsyth) June 7, 2016
From the Daily Mail’s Isabel Oakeshott
Well I think Cameron's satisfied expression at the end of that says it all. He didn't break sweat. #ITVEURef
— Isabel Oakeshott (@IsabelOakeshott) June 7, 2016
From LBC’s Iain Dale
Cameron will be very happy with this. A nation beaten down by total, utter boredom. Nothing to see, move along. Not a bollock dropped.
— Iain Dale (@IainDale) June 7, 2016
From ITV’s Paul Brand
My verdict: No knock out blow tonight from either Farage or Cameron, but think definitely an advantage that PM went second. #ITVEURef
— Paul Brand (@PaulBrandITV) June 7, 2016
From the Sunday Times’s India Knight
Cameron is good because he is engaged and courteous to everybody. It’s not nothing.
— India Knight (@indiaknight) June 7, 2016
From ConservativeHome’s Mark Wallace
All in all, Cameron had best of it - but in some sport where there's normally loads of points. 3-0 in rugby, or 10-0 in Quidditch #ITVEURef
— Mark Wallace (@wallaceme) June 7, 2016
From the Independent’s Jon Stone
Cameron is basically reaping what all politicians have sown by refusing to make any argument for immigration for about a decade #ITVEURef
— Jon Stone (@joncstone) June 7, 2016
From the New Statesman’s George Eaton
Not hard to see why Cameron won a majority and Farage has never become an MP. #ITVEURef
— George Eaton (@georgeeaton) June 7, 2016
From Huffington Post’s Paul Waugh
I doubt that hour shifted any 'undecideds' either way. People moan about PMQs but at least it has life. Maybe Thurs debate will be better
— Paul Waugh (@paulwaugh) June 7, 2016
From the Sunday Telegraph’s Tim Ross
Cameron seems to be saying the EU referendum is really a choice between Little England & Great Britain. Isn't that a different referendum?
— Tim Ross (@TimRossDT) June 7, 2016
From the Sunday Times’s Tim Shipman
Cameron did better than last week and Farage not as well as against Clegg. But I doubt either will move the markets.
— Tim Shipman (@ShippersUnbound) June 7, 2016
A friend points out that not being a quitter was originally a Richard Nixon line. (He did quit of course)
— Tim Shipman (@ShippersUnbound) June 7, 2016
The winners tonight: Sky News
— Tim Shipman (@ShippersUnbound) June 7, 2016
From the BBC’s Sam Macrory
Decent enough performances. Neither a new positive line or a disastrous gaffe to dramatically shift things. #ITVEURef
— Sam Macrory (@sammacrory) June 7, 2016
That said, fair to say that Cameron stayed calmer throughout and looked happier at the end. Helps to go second.. #ITVEURef
— Sam Macrory (@sammacrory) June 7, 2016
Farage rejects archbishop's claim that he is racist
This is what Nigel Farage said when challenged about Justin Welby, the archbishop of Canterbury, accusing him of being racist. Farage said:
I’m used to being demonised ...
I’m not going to stand and attack the Archbishop of Canterbury but he would have done better to read what I actually said ... It is a tiddly issue in the this campaign. I knew the Remainers would come to me and conflate what I said.
Vote Leave accuses Cameron of telling five lies
And this is from Vote Leave’s chief executive Matthew Elliott.
This morning David Cameron called for more honesty in the EU debate but tonight he told five outright lies.
He lied about being able to remove EU jobseekers without a job after six months, our ability to stop foreign criminals walking into the UK, our ability to deport foreign criminals, his pledge to restrict benefits and how much his government is investing in the NHS.
He still claims that Turkey won’t join the EU while his government is spending £1 billion to help speed up their membership. The truth is you can’t trust anything David Cameron says on the EU. That is why you should Vote Leave on 23 June.
Here is Britain Stronger in Europe’s take on the debate. This is from the briefing they have sent out to journalists.
David Cameron set out a confident, positive and patriotic vision for Britain to remain stronger in Europe, rather than quitting for Nigel Farage and the Leave campaign’s little England.
Nigel Farage offered no plan for Britain’s future and advocated the most damaging economic alternative for the UK, falling on the WTO, which would cost jobs, put up prices and risk our children’s future.
That is the choice for the country on 23rd June: a Great Britain stronger in Europe or a little England out on our own, which is a risk to our country’s future.
Cameron v Farage - Snap verdict
Cameron v Farage - Snap verdict: Overall, that felt like a relatively anaemic non-encounter that was short on memorable moments and which will have little overall impact on the campaign. Cameron will be pleased with his performance, although he was aided by having questions which seemed notably softer than those directed to Farage. In news terms, what he said about a vote to leave the EU hastening the break-up of the UK may be the most significant line of the evening. (See 9.49am.) Previously he has dismissed the idea that a Brexit vote would justify a second Scottish independence referendum, and the SNP are likely to bank what he said tonight as a concession that a second independence referendum would be justified. But this was not Cameron’s focus. As usual, he wanted to highlight the threat posed to the economy by leaving. Cameron’s manner was smoother than Farage’s, and he probably scored a bit more on soundbite bingo than his opponent.
The most interesting division that opened up between them was on the importance of GDP. It is rare to hear anyone in politics say that there is more to life than money, but Farage said that it was a mistake to view the migration argument solely through this prism. Cutting immigration would be worth it even if the UK ended up poorer, he said. That is a coherent position, and a brave one. And it differentiates him from Cameron, who attacked Farage for saying this. But, overall, the main impression Farage made was of a tetchy man on the defensive. His interactions with two of the women who questioned him were unattractive (even if one of them did seem reluctant to listen to what he said) and his line about being misrepresented by the Sunday Telegraph on Cologne was not especially convincing. I don’t recall him complaining about the headline on the day.
The format did not help. Etchingham left almost all questioning to the audience, which meant Cameron and Farage were not exposed to the forensic follow-up questions that were sometimes required. And it felt as if they were trying to cover too much ground. More detailed questioning might have been better.
Updated
Cameron says he wants to fight for a great Britain in the EU. Don’t take the Nigel Farage, “little England” option, he says.
And that’s it.
Q: Just today we have seen more evidence of crimes committed by EU nationals. If we stay, how can we protect ourselves.
Cameron says we are keeping border controls. If people are a risk, they are not allowed in.
He says he is frustrated by how hard it is to get foreign prisoners out of our prisons. In the EU we have a directive to allow this to happen. If we do not leave, it will be much harder.
Q: The 50 foreign prisoners named today are here because we cannot send them back. Why is that?
Cameron says that is because the prisoner transfer deal he talked about is not yet fully in force.
He is old enough to remember the time when criminals fled to the Costa del Crime and never came back.
Updated
Cameron says he does not want the European parliament to have more power.
If there is any plan to pass more powers to Brussels, there will be a lock. The British will have a referendum.
The question is not, “Do I like the European parliament?”. Cameron says he does not like it much himself. But frustrations are not an excuse for walking away.
Q: Isn’t it shameful that parliament is no longer sovereign?
Cameron says Britain is engaged in a big act of democracy.
And parliament is sovereign, he says.
He says he loves his country. If you love your country, you should not damage it. And if we left the EU, that could hasten its break up, he says.
Q: But parliament is over-ruled by some judges who have never set foot in our country. That’s a disgrace.
Cameron says sovereignty is about having a say. If we leave the EU, we will have no say over the single market.
Leaving the EU may give the illusion of sovereignty.
Cameron says Britain needs to be in the EU, fighting for British interests and jobs.
He says Britons are not quitters. We should not quit.
Q: But we did not get the deal we wanted.
Cameron says he got what he wanted with regard to EU migrants. If they have not got a job after six months, they will have to leave. And they will only get full benefits after four years.
Q: By how much will migration fall as a result of this.
Cameron says in his first five years as prime minister the UK created more jobs than the rest of the EU put together. So migration figures have varied hugely. But cutting access to benefits will make a difference. He won’t put a figure, though, on the amount by which it may fall.
Updated
Q: The NHS is under immense pressure. If we stay in, what plans to you have to help it.
Cameron says he has a plan for the NHS.
Q: We are really under resourced. What will you put in place to deal with that?
Cameron says the government will put in an extra £12bn over the course of this parliament.
Q: You need to give us more resources.
Q: How is uncontrolled immigration working for me?
Cameron says there are good ways of controlling immigration, and bad ways. If we want to build houses and safeguard services, we have to strengthen our economy. Farage said GDP did not matter. But GDP is our economy. We need that to create jobs.
Q: My standard of living is going down because of this influx you cannot control. You said in our statement last week that leaving would be rolling a dice on our future. I feel the opposite.
Cameron says he does not agree. If we leave, there would be fewer jobs for our children and grandchildren. He says we do not want to be the little England of Nigel Farage.
Q: You gave an excellent speech in 2013, saying you wanted to curb free movement. That would have been excellent for me. I run a small business and would have been able to hire more Commonwealth workers. But you were humiliated.
Cameron says he thinks the deal he got curbing migrants’ benefits is a real advance.
Q: I have had to spend thousands of pounds getting a tier two visa for my staff and wait over a year. But unskilled people from the EU can just walk in.
Cameron says he favours doing more to train people here.
If there is a shortage of people in an occupation, they should be trained.
Cameron
David Cameron is on now.
Q: If leaving the EU is so dangerous, why did you offer a referendum.
Cameron says he is listening to the views of experts when he warns about the economic consequences of leaving.
He says Nigel Farage said multinationals would not reduce their investments in the UK. But if we were in the same position as America, as Farage proposed, there would be 10% tariffs. So jobs would be lost.
Farage - Snap verdict
Farage - Snap verdict: That felt distinctly underwhelming. Most of the questions to Farage were critical, and there were very few moments when it felt as if he were winning them over. His best answer may have been his first, on the ERM. It is unusual to hear a politician have a go at a member of the public in a setting like this, and so Farage’s anti-pharmaceuticals reprimand had an interesting, leftish tinge to it. And some people will not have heard him speak out about falling living standards. But his aggressive stance towards the woman who asked about his Cologne comments will have gone down badly.
Updated
Q: This is a once in a generation opportunity. What will the EU look like if we stay in?
Farage says he thinks it is done for. The migrant crisis is a catastrophe. The project does not work, he says. He says he wants us to get back to a democratic Europe.
That’s the last question to Farage.
Q: If we leave the EU, we will still be members of a host of organisations.
I hope so, says Farage.
Q: So will leaving the EU really guarantee sovereignty? Or is this just a red herring.
Farage says the UK will be able to take its seat on the WTO.
Q: The head of Europol says leaving the EU would be bad for security.
Farage says the same thing applies. Some people say leaving the EU would be bad for security. Some says it would be good for the UK.
He says mass immigration has led to extremists coming into Europe.
He takes out his passport. It says European passport on it, he says. He says he wants to bring back British passports and border controls.
Q: EU migrants contribute more to the economy than they take out.
Farage says the House of Lords looked at this. They said in economic terms it is probably about neutral.
But Cameron will tell you immigration is a wonderful economic benefit.
Farage says the population is rising so much that we need to value quality of life, as well as GDP. He says we need to build a new house every four minutes, night and day, to house migrants.
Q: We have an ageing population. We will need migrants.
Farage says nowhere else in the world is the argument made that to trade with each other you need free movement.
Q: But you do in the EU.
Farage says Americans don’t have to accept free movement.
Updated
Q: You are going to increase fear and discrimination affecting black people.
Farage says he disagrees. He thinks the current system discriminates against people from the Commonwealth.
Q: You are anti-immigration. Non-white people will feel discriminated against.
If you want to think that ...
Q: I don’t just think that. A lot of black people feel like this.
Farage says lots of black people voted for Ukip, or stood for the party.
Q: Where is your evidence?
Farage says the questioner is not letting him finish.
He says an open borders policy is damaging all communities.
Q: Why are you saying migrants will attack women?
Farage says he has been quoted out of context. What you see in paper headlines does not always reflect what is said. He is saying we have seen in Germany large numbers of people come from cultures where attitudes to women are different.
Q: Aren’t you embarrassed that Justin Welby is saying you are racist?
Farage says he does not want to attack the archbishop. But the archbishop should read what he said. He says a German cleric said something similar.
Q: You say wages will rise if we leave the EU. Won’t that make us uncompetitive?
Farage says we have artificially created an over-supply of labour. That has driven down the cost. People on average salaries have living standards that are 10% lower.
Q: But by artificially driving up the cost of wages, business will migrate elsewhere.
Farage says this is the argument of Lord Rose. He is meant to be leading the In campaign, but he has gone into hibernation. Rose said wages would go up if we left the EU, but that would be a bad thing. But Farage says there is more to life than what is good for business.
It is “wrong, wrong, wrong” that for average families their living standards have fallen by 10%, he says.
- Farage says it is “wrong, wrong, wrong” that average families have seen their living standards fallen by 10%.
Updated
Q: If we leave we may be punished by the EU.
Farage says 40 years ago we voted for tariff-free access to the EU. But tariffs have now come down. For the benefit of tariff-free access to a market that sells more to us than we sell to them, we have to obey regulations and cannot make our own trade deals.
Imagine this goes badly. If the French and Germans put tariffs on us, the cost of those will still be lower than the cost of EU membership.
Q: Jean-Claude Juncker says deserters will not be welcome.
Isn’t he charming, says Farage.
He says we are British. We will not be bullied by anyone.
Q: Multinationals come here because we are in the EU. Is it worth risking thousands of jobs?
Farage says he does not accept that firms are here just because we are in the EU.
Q: I am in pharmaceuticals. I have to be in the EU to do my job.
Farage says he does not like the way this industry behaves. He says they spend a fortune on lobbying. And they squeeze out alternative medicines.
Q: The European Medicine Agency is in London. We cannot do what we do if we are not in the EU.
Farage says our biggest industry is not pharmaceuticals, but financial services.
Q: Most experts think leaving the EU is a risk. What have I got to gain from it?
Nigel Farage says this is what got him into politics. The Tory government went into the ERM. David Cameron was in the Treasury then. They said the ERM was a good idea. But it all went wrong. Then 10 years later the same lot recommended the euro. That went wrong. Now they want us to stay in the EU. They suffer from groupthink.
Farage says people in post support the status quo. But when they leave office, like Digby Jones or Mervyn King, they take a different view.
Updated
Cameron & Farage Live
Julie Etchingham introduces the programme.
Nigel Farage comes on stage.
Good point from the New Statesman’s George Eaton.
Irony of Vote Leave's complaint over Farage's appearance is that Boris and Gove have been borrowing his lines. #ITVEURef
— George Eaton (@georgeeaton) June 7, 2016
A large majority of Britons distrust both David Cameron and Nigel Farage when it comes to the EU: #ITVEURef pic.twitter.com/g71x3E2gIX
— Britain Elects (@britainelects) June 7, 2016
And another. Andy Wigmore is head of communications for Leave.EU.
Fancy a beer after this Prime Minster? @Nigel_Farage #ITVEURef pic.twitter.com/oeAK8nZON3
— Andy Wigmore (@andywigmore) June 7, 2016
Here is a picture of Cameron and Farage meeting backstage.
Good evening Prime Minister - good evening @Nigel_Farage #ITVEURef pic.twitter.com/lI22viNL0y
— Andy Wigmore (@andywigmore) June 7, 2016
Prime Minister David Cameron arrives ahead of #ITVEURef grillinghttps://t.co/mgKC741dQq pic.twitter.com/RZAPUaDAwK
— ITV News (@itvnews) June 7, 2016
And here is Nigel Farage tweeting.
Arrived for #ITVEURef. Looking forward to setting out why I believe we could do so much better outside of the EU. pic.twitter.com/XwzDc3dcM4
— Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) June 7, 2016
David Cameron has tweeted about the debate.
I'll be explaining why Britain is better off in the EU and we shouldn't take a leap in the dark with Nigel Farage on ITV at 9pm. #ITVEURef.
— David Cameron (@David_Cameron) June 7, 2016
As the BBC’s Martin Rosenbaum reports, an internal campaign document produced by Grassroots Out, a campaign organisation backed by Nigel Farage, said that Farage should only be used “sparingly” in the campaign because of his potential to alienate voters.
In other words, even his own allies have reservations about his appeal.
This morning Britain Stronger in Europe posted on Twitter a short video attacking Nigel Farage very strongly. It highlights some of the most objectionable things he has said.
Here’s leading Leave campaigner Nigel Farage in his own words. Do you want to live in Farage’s Britain?https://t.co/2fokDvC1Qk
— Stronger In (@StrongerIn) June 7, 2016
This builds on a line George Osborne, the Conservative chancellor, used in an interview in the Sunday Times at the weekend (paywall). Osborne said voting to leave the EU would amount to voting to live in “Farage’s Britain”. He told the paper:
This is a battle between Farage’s mean vision of Britain and the outward-facing, generous Britain that the mainstream of this country celebrates. I say: we don’t want Farage’s Britain. That means voting to remain.
Nigel Farage gave an interview to the Daily Telegraph ahead of tonight’s debate. Here are some of the points he made.
- Farage said he would be taking a stand against the establishment. He said:
It will be a big pitch against the establishment and I shall be saying to people ‘if ever there was a vote in your life that could make a difference, this is it’.”
The big issue is to say to people ‘don’t listen to a political class backed up with their mates and their multi-national businesses and big banks for whom the EU and corporatism has been enriching. Your lives have been made miserable by this’.
The only people leaving the EU would make poorer are the ruling classes. Families like the Camerons might be worse off outside the EU.
- He said he would be attacking David Cameron’s integrity. Asked if he would question Cameron’s patriotism, he replied:
Well, I think is a real issue. Yes the prime minister’s integrity is I think up for question in all of this ...
For years I have been clear, consistent and I believe absolutely truthful about the damage that his pol project has done to this country at a democratic and economic level.
I want the audience to see that and to ask themselves the question in their minds about a prime minister who promises to reduce net migration to tens of thousands becomes prime minister on the back of it and doesn’t have the ability to deliver it.
- He revealed that he had not had a drink for a week as he had been preparing for the encounter.
It is a big moment for the campaign – I am not taking it lightly I am thinking very hard about it.
To get a sense of quite how significant this is, you need to remember that, according to Ben Wright’s new book about politicians and drinking, Farage’s normal rule is that he won’t appear on TV if he has had more than five pints.
- He said that he would be highlighting the government’s failure to address the risk of Turkish accession to the EU, poor border security, illegal immigration and protecting Britain’s fishing stocks from foreign trawlers.
Here is the ITV set being built for tonight’s programme at a studio at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, east London.
On BBC News a moment ago Steven Woolfe, Ukip’s immigration, said that Justin Welby, the archbishop of Canterbury, had misinterpreted what Farage said about the risk of mass, Cologne-style attacks on women being higher if the UK stayed in the EU.
Farage made his comments in an interview with the Sunday Telegraph this weekend. For the record, here is the key excerpt.
Women could be at risk of mass sex attacks carried out by gangs of migrant men if Britain stays in the EU, Nigel Farage has warned.
The UK Independence Party leader said he fears “big cultural issues” will result from the failure to control migration from Europe and North Africa, putting the safety of women in danger ...
“The nuclear bomb this time would be about Cologne,” he told the Telegraph. Women may be at a particular risk from the “cultural” differences between British society and migrants, after gangs of migrant men allegedly launched a mass sexual attack against hundreds of women in Germany last New Year’s Eve, he said.
“There are some very big cultural issues,” he said. Asked whether mass sex attacks on the scale of Cologne could happen in Britain, Mr Farage replied: “It depends if they get EU passports. It depends if we vote for Brexit or not. It is an issue.”
Mr Farage said voters must consider the security threat posed by the migrant crisis when considering the referendum on whether to leave or stay in the EU.
After some discussion in the office, we decided we would call it a debate. Nigel Farage and David Cameron may not actually be debating each other head to head, but in tonight’s ITV referendum programme, they will be in the same building, on the same show, and debating the EU referendum issues in response to questions from the audience. Farage is going to go first, and Cameron will follow, and Julie Etchingham will be moderating throughout the hour-long programme. It is the closest we are going to get in the campaign to seeing Cameron take on one of his opponents. And, of course, after it’s over, people will be making a judgment as to who “won”.
We had two important TV events last week - the Sky News programmes with Cameron and Michael Gove - but this is bigger, not least because it’s on ITV. As YouGov’s Marcus Roberts writes in a good blog about the encounter, “the EU campaigns’ move to primetime, mainstream TV represents the moment when undecideds switch on and tune into the referendum for real.” It is also the first time Farage has had a big TV platform during the campaign. The Ukip leader is not part of the official out campaign, Vote Leave, and frankly they treat him as a bit of a bad smell. But arguably we would not be having the vote if it were not for the rise of Ukip, which has spent 20 years campaigning for a referendum on EU membership. Vote Leave is furious about Farage being given such a prominent platform and, when tonight’s event was announced, it sent out a bizarre press notice to journalist, quoting a “senior Vote Leave sources” sounding like a poundshop mafioso warning that ITV would face “consequences” for what it had done.
And why are Vote Leave so worried about Farage? Because he is deeply polarising, and his highly-charged attacks on migrants have taken him to the boundaries of respectable opinion, and beyond. Only this afternoon Justin Welby, the archbishop of Canterbury, accused him of racism and said that “utterly condemned” comments made by Farage at the weekend that sexual assaults by migrants were the “nuclear bomb” of the EU referendum. Our full story on that is here.
In the past Farage has tended to assume that articulating the concerns of people marginalised by the Westminster elite works to his advantage, but Ukip have done best electorally in European elections decided by proportional representation. To win the EU referendum Leave will need a majority, and that requires appealing to centrists too.
The programme starts at 9pm. I will be covering it in full, posting a snap reaction afterwards, as well as summing up the main news lines and bringing you all the best reaction and analysis.
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