‘ We are entitled to be suspicious about the regulations’
ministers want to use their private offi ces to organise their speaking tours and want to use their special advisers who are paid with taxpayers’ money.
“That is not acceptable. What is the point of having spending limits on the Yes and No campaigns if the Govern ment can avail itself of these advantages?”
Earlier the MP, who chairs the Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee, said his amendment would effectively prevent ministers from “bouncing us into a very early referendum with only a very few weeks between the negotiations and the referendum result”.
He told BBC Radio 4’ s World At One: “It would also have the effect of making sure that the rules are clear well in advance of the referendum.
“This is meant to be a solemn constitutional exercise, not a trick or a device to get the Government out of a problem. Jenkin wants a level playing fi eld Clement Attlee used to say that referendums were the device of demagogues and dictators. I do hope the Government is not being tempted down that path.” Labour MPs were also backing a separate amendment seeking to impose a tougher version of the purdah rules which ban the use of public money to promote one side in the fi nal 28 days of a referendum campaign. A spokesman said ministers were trying to “pull a fast one” by
a d o p t i n g “skimmed milk” restrictions, rather than the “full fat” version preferred by Labour.
Mr Cameron has already granted a string of concessions to try to prevent a Tory rebellion.
Earl ier this year, 27 Conservative MPs voted against a similar amendment – although on that occasion ministers avoided defeat as Labour abstained.
The row comes as a surprise opinion poll suggested voters would narrowly vote to leave the EU at the referendum, which is due before the end of 2017.
The Survation poll found that, if held now, people would vote by 52 per cent to 49 per cent to quit Brussels.