So it’s on. In just four months Britain will vote whether to stay or leave
Punters make IN a 70% chance
So the starting gun has been fired on the EU membership referendum which will take place as planned on June 23rd. This is just 4 months away.
It means that the referendum campaign will in many ways be running at the same time as the Scottish Welsh and of course London elections which happen at the start of May.
What’s been striking today is the range of coordinated activity on the part of the IN campaign.
Clearly a lot depends on how the deal agreed in Brussels last night actually goes down. In many ways Cameron is helped by the very low expectations that existed beforehand of what the negotiation would achieve.
On Wednesday Ipsos-MORI found that for every one person believing that Cameron was going to get a good deal they were two who believed that he wasn’t. So ministers start from a very low base. Other pollsters had similar findings on expectations.
The big issue now is whether the OUT campaign can get its act together under a coordinated strong leader. Boris is apparently going to announce what he’s going to do tomorrow.
The betting has moved away from BREXIT during the last 24 hours. I’d expect some polling even tonight.
A big problem for Cameron was seen in this morning’s newspapers. Generally the Tory press is hostile and wants Britain to leave. This means that effectively the campaign could be Cameron vs the Tory press – the same media that played such a part in getting him elected last May.