‘I’ve got an idea’... Caine wants out
SIR Michael Caine yesterday sprinkled stardust on the campaign to get Britain out of the European Union – saying the country should no longer be ‘dictated to by thousands of faceless civil servants’ in Brussels.
The Oscar-winner triggered delight in the Leave camp by saying he felt ‘certain’ Britain should come out of the EU.
Welcoming the move, Ukip leader Nigel Farage – paraphrasing Sir Michael’s famous line from The Italian Job – said: ‘ Let’s blow the bloody doors off.’
Tory grandee Michael Howard and Cabinet minister Theresa Villiers also dropped hints they will back so-called Brexit.
The Leave campaign has struggled to attract big names to front its campaign ahead of the EU referendum. In a BBC interview, Sir Michael said he had been caught in two minds on how to vote as both options were ‘scary’.
However, pushed on his views on the EU, he said: ‘To me you’ve now got in Europe a sort of government by proxy of everybody who has now got carried away and I think unless there are some extremely significant changes we should get out.
‘You cannot be dictated to by thousands of faceless civil servants who make these rules and you say “oh, wait a minute”. I sort of feel certain we should come out.’
Also appearing on Radio 4’s Today programme, former Tory party leader Lord Howard said: ‘I have always wanted the United Kingdom to remain in a genuinely reformed European Union.
‘It’s not looking very likely, I have to say, that we’re going to see a genuinely reformed European Union.’
Ex-Tory leaders William Hague and Sir John Major have said they want to stay in the EU, while Iain Duncan Smith is almost certain to be the most senior Tory to campaign for Out.
Northern Ireland Secretary Mrs Villiers said that Britain could be a ‘success’ outside the EU. Asked whether she thought it would be a ‘disaster’ if Britain stayed in the EU under its current terms, Mrs Villiers said: ‘Certainly no one is happy with the status quo. The Prime Minister isn’t, the Government isn’t.
‘And frankly I think there are many people across this country who would agree that the European Union needs to change, it needs to become more competitive.’
She said how she votes will depend on David Cameron’s membership renegotiation.