Britain's top business leaders no longer favour joining the euro, a poll says.
The MORI survey, which questioned 164 chairmen and chief executives drawn from Britain's top 500 companies, said 50 per cent do not support the principle of British participation in the single currency against 42 per cent who do.
In 1997, when the question was first asked, 70 per cent supported joining the single currency. This is the first time since then that there has been a majority against the euro.
The MORI poll comes only two weeks after a Chambers of Commerce survey which showed that almost two-thirds of businesses opposed joining the euro any time soon even if the government announced its five economic tests have been met.
The government has said it is in favour of joining the euro as long as the tests which it has pledged to assess by June are passed, and subject to public approval in a referendum.
Opinion polls, however, show that most Britons remain opposed to giving up the pound for the euro.
It is only five months before the government must decide whether the economic conditions are right for membership.But separate analysis by MORI, to be published later this week, shows that many people are open to persuasion about joining the euro.