‘Time to put Britain first again’
Top entrepreneurs launch Vote Leave campaign as Merkel arrives for EU reform talks with Cameron
SOME of Britain’s most successful entrepreneurs have joined forces with senior figures from across the political spectrum to call for the country to leave the European Union.
The group, which is called Vote Leave, counts among its supporters the founders of some of Britain’s best- known companies as well as dozens of MPs and peers.
The group is concerned that EU red tape is damaging businesses and that it “cannot cope” with the “technological and economic forces” that are changing the world.
The campaign group announced last night that it will immediately begin making the case for Britain to leave the EU amid concerns that David Cameron will fail to win back significant powers from Brussels.
It says that if Britain votes to leave the EU in the referendum, which will take place before the end of 2017, it can develop a “new friendly relationship” with the union based on free trade deals. The prominence of the group’s backers, many of whom are self-made, is likely to alarm those who want Britain to stay in the EU. It will help neutralise the claims by the Remain side that a so-called “Brexit” could harm the UK’s economy.
The Prime Minister will tonight host Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, at Chequers where he will try to secure support for his EU reform agenda.
The Daily Telegraph understands that Mrs Merkel will ask Mr Cameron to clarify his demands amid concerns in Germany that Britain is being too “vague” about what it wants.
The launch of Vote Leave will exacerbate divisions among Eurosceptics as it will take on Leave.EU, a Ukip-backed group, to become the official “No” cam- paign. Gordon Brown, the former Labour prime minister, last night warned that people will vote to leave the EU if Eurosceptics are successful at portraying themselves as “the sole defenders of Britain”.
Steve Baker, a Conservative MP and one of Vote Leave’s leading members, said: “We support the creation of a professional cross-party campaign that can fight the referendum if the EU does not give the Prime Minister fundamental change. We have established a great relationship with people from across the political spectrum.”
The group has appointed three treasurers with “deep pockets” to help drive the campaign and attract funding before formal limits on spending are in- troduced four months before the start of the referendum. They include Peter Cruddas, a self-made financial services entrepreneur and former co-treasurer of the Conservative Party worth a reported £1.5 billion. He has donated £1.4 million to the Conservatives.
The two other co-treasurers are John Mills, the head of JML, the television shopping giant, and the largest individual donor to the Labour Party; and Stuart Wheeler, the spread-betting pioneer and former Ukip treasurer who has given the party more than £800,000.
Leading businessmen supporting the campaign include Crispin Odey, who is worth £1.1 billion and has donated £200,000 to the Tories and given funding to Ukip; and John Caudwell, the entrepreneur and philanthropist, who is worth £1.4 billion.
Other prominent Conservative figures include Michael Freeman, a property developer who has previously donated £780,000.
Lord Kalms, a former treasurer of the Conservative Party and life president of Dixons; Christopher Foyle, the chairman of Foyles bookshop, and Joe Foster, the founder of Reebok, have all backed the campaign.
In an article for The Daily Telegraph Mr Foster said: “British politicians
have given away control over key parts of our economy to the EU.
“Entrepreneurs have suffered, smaller businesses have been hit and innovation has been stifled. We have sent billions to the EU each year and got little in return.”
The group is also supported by Conservatives for Britain, a group of senior Tory politicians which has Lord Lawson, the former Chancellor, as its president. Tory MPs backing the campaign include Owen Paterson, the former environment secretary, and Bernard Jenkin, chairman of the public administration select committee.
A group of Labour MPs is also backing the campaign led by Kate Hoey, who said that if Britain left the union “we will be able to trade freely with the EU and have friendly co-operation”.
Figures from other parties backing the campaign include Baroness Jones of the Green Party and Lord Trimble, the former leader of the DUP.
Douglas Carswell, Ukip’s only MP, is also backing the campaign. He said: “I look forward to building a campaign that has no interest in party loyalties and is focused on what is best for Britain and our friends in Europe.”
To mark its launch, the group last night published a poll by ICM, which was conducted shortly after Mr Cameron’s speech at the Conservative Party conference. It found that 53 per cent of voters will back the campaign to leave unless Mr Cameron can negotiate a deal that ends the supremacy of EU law in Britain.
Mr Brown said in Glasgow last night: “The danger in the European campaign is we must never allow those people who want to leave the European Union – and I’m not one of them, I want us to stay in – to pose as the sole defenders of Britain.”