In the telephone poll, 45 per cent said they favoured leaving while 42 per cent said they backed remaining. His comments triggered an angry reaction from remain campaigners, who accused him of reaching for the “Farage playbook”.
Advertisement
Labour MP Emma Reynolds, a member of the House of Commons Health Select Committee, said: “Chris Grayling has let the cat out of the bag”. Many voters are concerned about the strains placed on schools, hospitals and housing from people moving to live in Britain.
“So to everyone who is of the younger generation, who is thinking how they are going to vote, my message is think about your goal of getting onto and working up the housing ladder?”
The ICM survey is the latest in a series of boosts for the “leave” campaign, halting a recovery in sterling in its tracks.
“The G7 recognises the ongoing large-scale movements of migrants and refugees as a global challenge which requires a global response”, the leaders said, adding that they “commit to increase global assistance to meet immediate and longer-term needs of refugees…as well as their host communities”.
Sterling fell against the euro and 15 other major after the ICM opinion polls released yesterday by the “Guardian” newspaper showed a lead for the “leave” camp.
UK Prime Minister David Cameron has been campaigning for Britain to stay in, with recent polls suggesting a widening lead for supporters of continued European Union membership.
John Longworth for the Vote Leave Business Council said: “These daily threats are becoming absurd”.
“There is no evidence for Chris Grayling’s claims”.
For the online poll, 47 per cent wanted to leave, 44 per cent to remain, and 9 per cent said they were undecided. “It is not about race, colour, creed, background, it is about the housing market, it is about pressure on the national health service, it is about the number of cars on the road, it is about school places”, he said.
The Prime Minister, David Cameron, seized on the figures, saying: “This poll confirms the overwhelming view of economists – leaving the European Union would damage our economy, costing jobs and increasing prices”.
The argument hinges on what route Britain would take if it votes to leave the EU.
“We can not conceive of a situation where that government would not provide comparable support to farmers, nor that that government would not provide comparable support to our universities for science, for example”.
Polls have shown Britain’s historic referendum is too close to call, with both sides arguing over the impact a vote to leave would have on the economy.
Advertisement
“Even though a United Kingdom exit would take some time to complete, especially as renegotiating our revised status with Europe could take five to seven years from start to completion, there will be immediate effects created by this uncertainty”.
