EU economic debate is far from settled

On the economic front, the EU referendum debate has been pretty much one-way traffic so far. An alliance of multinational companies, the Bank of England, the IMF, the CBI and HM Treasury has sought to give the impression that this argument is done and dusted. Mark Carney, the Bank governor, even went so far last week as to predict a recession, albeit a temporary one, if the country left the EU.

Undoubtedly, fear of what might happen to jobs, wages and prices will prey heavily on the minds of voters as the June 23 referendum draws closer. It will be hard to make the leap of faith necessary to vote Leave if there is a consensus among business leaders and economists that doing so will be to flirt with disaster.

But there isn’t a consensus. As the letter on this page attests, hundreds of small and medium-sized businesses – and some larger ones – do not share the views of the cosy cartel that likes to claim it represents the entirety of job-creating companies and entrepreneurs.

Moreover, if it is so critical to the British economy that we remain, how do we explain the fact that for the past 15 years, the EU has grown at a third of the rate of the global average, and the eurozone has done even worse than that?

Europe’s share of global GDP is falling and so is its share of global trade. If we were outside the EU now would we be thinking of joining it on economic grounds?

We no longer carry out the vast majority of our trade with Europe and for the past few years have traded more with the rest of the world than with our European partners. We run a record trade deficit with countries such as Germany and our businesses have to deal with regulations that are often framed to suit the needs of those in other countries.

Of course, big business groups want Britain to stay in – not because it is necessarily in the country’s best interests but because it is in their own. They have made huge investments linked to Europe and their concerns should not be lightly dismissed; but nor should we be under any illusions that their anxieties are not self-serving.

What they are unwilling to acknowledge are the opportunities that exist outside the EU – a failed economic model that has destroyed jobs and left young people across an entire continent with no hope of getting one. This argument, far from being over, is still very much alive.