Brexit: Leave campaign divided over immigration

As polls show support shifting away from Brexit ahead of Thursday’s referendum, divisions have emerged within the Leave campaign over its signature issue of immigration.

Justice secretary Michael Gove, who chairs Vote Leave, the official pro-Brexit campaign, sharply criticised a Ukip poster showing thousands of Syrian refugees under the headline “Breaking point”.

And former London mayor Boris Johnson sought to change the Leave campaign’s rhetoric on immigration, calling at a London rally for an amnesty for illegal immigrants who came to Britain more than 12 years ago.

‘Economically rational’

“It is the humane thing to do, it is the economically rational thing to do, and it is taking back control of a system that is, at the moment, completely out of control,” Mr Johnson said, to scattered boos and cries of protest from the audience.

“If we take back control of our immigration system with an Australian-style points-based system we will be dealing fairly and justly with every part of the world, and we will be neutralising people in this country and across Europe who wish to play politics with immigration, and who are opposed to immigration.”

Chancellor of the exchequer George Osborne earlier compared the Ukip poster to Nazi propaganda from the 1930s, but Ukip leader Nigel Farage stood by it. He hit back at his critics in Vote Leave, suggesting that they had sanctioned posters just as harsh in their rhetoric about immigration.

After more than a week of polls showing Leave opening up a significant lead, the latest polls offered better news for Remain, which was ahead in two out of four published on Sunday and tied in one.

Supplementary questions in some polls suggested that voters were more concerned about the economic risks of Brexit than before and were drifting towards a vote to remain in the EU.

It is unclear if last week’s murder of Labour MP Jo Cox has had an impact on voting intention, although Mr Farage suggested that it could have halted the momentum behind the Leave campaign.

“I think we have momentum – we did have momentum until this terrible tragedy,” he told ITV’s Robert Peston. “When you are taking on the establishment, you need to have momentum. I don’t know what is going to happen in the course of the next three or four days.”

The Leave campaign is sensitive to criticism of the tone of its rhetoric in the wake of Ms Cox’s murder and Vote Leave on Sunday suggested that many in the Remain camp had spoken just as robustly about immigration in the past.

‘Swarm’

A campaign press release listed a succession of statements from leading Remain campaigners, including David Cameron’s description of migrants crossing the Mediterranean as “a swarm” and foreign secretary Philip Hammond describing migrants as “marauding”.

Some Leave campaigners have complained that the Remain campaign is exploiting Ms Cox’s death for political advantage ahead of the referendum. Tory MP Andrew Murrison tweeted that the Remain side “spinning Jo Cox murder for partisan advantage in EU referendum is shameful”, although he later deleted the message.

Irish4Europe, which is campaigning among the Irish in Britain for a Remain vote, on Sunday released a video highlighting the potential impact of Brexit on Northern Ireland and British-Irish relations.

It features images from the Troubles and from key events in the peace process, including the visit of Queen Elizabeth to Ireland. “Together we have built bridges. Let’s not create borders,” it says.