Brown calls on wavering Labour supporters to vote for Remain

Former prime minister Gordon Brown and shadow foreign secretary Hillary Benn have appealed to Labour voters to vote to remain in the EU amid reports that the party's supporters are "haemorrhaging" to Brexit.

Mr Brown insisted that all the wings of the party were united in support of the EU, arguing that Labour voters had most to gain from staying in.

"Labour voters don't like the status quo. They want to know if they are going to be better off. We can show – and the European leaders I talk to want this to happen – that Britain can lead in Europe, " he said.

Mr Brown said that illegal immigration was a bigger problem than migration from within the EU, although he called on the government to do more to help communities where a rise in population was putting a strain on public services.

“If you look at the actual figures themselves, then 500,000 of the people you classify as Europeans coming into Britain are Irish citizens,” he said.

“Nobody wants to exclude the Irish citizens from Great Britain.”

Immigration goes on

Mr Benn said that immigration will continue even if Britain leaves the EU, and that Britain benefits from the work done by immigrants and the taxes they pay.

“When my father came towards the end of his life, most of the people who cared for him with such patience and gentleness had brought their care from abroad to this country. And in the years ahead, it will be our turn to be looked after,” he said.

“And as well as providing that care, we will need to pay for it, which is why it is utterly irresponsible to advocate a course of action that will lead to a weaker, less strong and less prosperous economy. This would damage our public services and make it more difficult to deal with, as we must, the pressures that immigration brings.”

While the Labour Party occupied the spotlight for the Remain campaign, Leave campaigners sought to keep the focus on immigration, seizing on a report by Migration Watch, which wants lower immigration, which suggests that EU immigration to Britain could rise to 250,000 a year. The think tank said a further 100,000 a year could enter Britain if Turkey joins the EU.

The Remain campaign received a boost when Conservative MP Andrew Tyrie, the fiercely independent chairman of the public accounts committee, said he would vote to stay in the EU.

No more control

Mr Tyrie, whose committee has heard from advocates on both sides in the campaign, said he had concluded that Britain would be worse off after Brexit, and he was sceptical about claims that leaving the EU would return greater control to Westminster.

"My own view is that much of the control that might come, post-Brexit, would be illusory," Mr Tyrie wrote in the Times. "Britain would still need to negotiate with the EU in pursuit of the national interest, whether in or out.

“It’s called international relations. From outside, the UK would lose influence over decisions that nonetheless profoundly affect the economy.

“Those who claim that this influence is illusory need to explain the UK’s exemption from the eurozone, Schengen, the migrant quota system, banking union, among much else,” he said.

“The UK cannot dictate. And the EU can be a very frustrating place to do business. But Britain’s influence is certainly not negligible.”