Responding to David Cameron unveiling a new Britain Stronger in Europe (BSE) campaign poster, Vote Leave is today publishing a series of graphics that highlight the costs of voting to remain in the EU. These include:

The cost of staying in the EU: £4,600 for every household

The cost of EU membership: £50 million every single day

The cost of EU membership: 250,000 EU immigrants every single year

Commenting, Vote Leave Chief Executive Matthew Elliott said:

‘David Cameron knows that not a single British family would lose that amount of money if we Vote Leave. In fact they would prosper as we spend our money on our priorities. Sadly, he failed to win even the most modest reforms to the EU in the renegotiation. He failed to keep his promise and make a positive case for the EU, choosing instead to do down Britain. Now he’s failing to be honest with hardworking families about the costs of the EU.

‘We hand £50 million to Brussels every day while EU regulations undermine our economy, democracy and borders. On 23 June it is safer to take control and Vote Leave.’

The cost of staying in the EU: £4,600 for every household (Source: HM Treasury)

In 2005, HM Treasury admitted that: ‘although Europe’s founders aimed to remove barriers and reap the benefits of expanded markets internally, they also sought protection and special treatment for particular aspects of their economies such as agriculture. This has brought costs: expensive subsidies still remain in some sectors and it is estimated that barriers to external trade and investment – such as tariffs, quotas and unjustifiably restrictive standards – could cost Europe’s consumers up to 7 per cent of EU GDP’.

This is the equivalent of £125.2 billion per year in today’s prices, or £4,638 per household.

The cost of EU membership: £50 million every single day (Source: Office for National Statistics)

In 2014, the UK paid £19.107 billion (gross) to the EU institutions.

This is the equivalent of £367.4 million per week, or £52.3 million per day.

The Head of the Statistics Authority, Sir Andrew Dilnot CBE, has said ‘Yes, the £19.1 billion figure is a legitimate figure for gross contributions … the official statistics are the £19.1 billion’.

The cost of EU membership: 250,000 EU immigrants every single year (Source: Office for National Statistics)

In the year ending September 2015, the inflow of EU migrants was 257,000.

This is equivalent to a city the size of Newcastle, Plymouth, or Wolverhampton.

The Government and BSE’s £4,300 figure is bogus

The Government calculates the £4,300 figure by dividing a putative 6% lesser increase in GDP growth by 2030 by the current number of households.

The Government divides the putative lesser increase in GDP of 6.2% by the current number of households.

This is extremely disingenuous, as official statistics show that the number of households in 2030 is projected to grow to 31.213 million. This is up from 26.994 in 2015, an increase of 4.219 million.

The report fails to consider the costs of EU regulation, which the Treasury has previously admitted are as high as 7% of GDP, or £4,638 per household.

The report does not quantify any potential savings of not having to apply EU regulation in the UK, but instead claims regulation would increase if we Vote Leave.

The report asserts that: ‘under any of the alternatives, the potential gains from additional flexibility on leaving the EU are likely to be significantly constrained, including because of domestic priorities and international obligations. These would be future government decisions. In any case, any potential gains from reduced EU regulatory burdens in specific areas would be significantly outweighed by the losses from the increased regulatory barriers and divergence from no longer being a member of the Single Market. Consistent with this assessment and the approach throughout this analysis, the modelling does not prejudge these decisions and no further assumptions on regulation are made over and above the increase in regulatory barriers that would emerge over time, as captured in the modelling of the effects of the alternative arrangements on trade and FDI’.

In 2005, HM Treasury admitted that: ‘although Europe’s founders aimed to remove barriers and reap the benefits of expanded markets internally, they also sought protection and special treatment for particular aspects of their economies such as agriculture. This has brought costs: expensive subsidies still remain in some sectors and it is estimated that barriers to external trade and investment – such as tariffs, quotas and unjustifiably restrictive standards – could cost Europe’s consumers up to 7 per cent of EU GDP’.

This is the equivalent of £125.2 billion per year in today’s prices, or £4,638 per household.

This is likely an underestimate, as the burden of EU regulation has increased. Open Europe‘s regular analysis of the cost of just the 100 most burdensome EU laws found in 2013 that the cost to the UK economy was £27.5 billion, but just a few months later had to uprate this to £33.3 billion.

The £4,300 figure is based on the Government breaking its promise to reduce net migration to the tens of thousands in every year of this Parliament.

The Government’s document states that: ‘The population and migration projections which underlie the modelling were used by the OBR in their Economic and fiscal outlook accompanying Budget 2016. It is assumed that population growth will slow in line with the ONS’s current principal population projections. In the principal projection, total net international migration to the UK falls from 329,000 per year in 2014 towards 185,000 per year from 2021 onwards’.

The OBR’s central forecast is that net migration will be in excess of the 100,000 target in every year of this Parliament, contrary to the Government’s manifesto.

The 2010 Conservative Manifesto promised that ‘we will take steps to take net migration back to the levels of the 1990s – tens of thousands a year, not hundreds of thousands’.

The 2015 Conservative Manifesto pledged to ‘keep our ambition of delivering annual net migration in the tens of thousands, not the hundreds of thousands’.

The lowest net migration has been since 2010 was 177,000 in 2012. Net migration in 2014 was 313,000, of which 174,000 persons came from the EU.

In her speech to the 2015 Conservative Party conference in Manchester, the Home Secretary, Theresa May, said: ‘not all of the consequences can be managed, and doing so for many of them comes at a high price… But even if we could manage all the consequences of mass immigration, Britain does not need net migration in the hundreds of thousands every year… The evidence – from the OECD, the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee and many academics – shows that while there are benefits of selective and controlled immigration, at best the net economic and fiscal effect of high immigration is close to zero.  So there is no case, in the national interest, for immigration of the scale we have experienced over the last decade. Neither is it true that, in the modern world, immigration is no longer possible to control… The numbers coming from Europe are unsustainable and the rules have to change’.

If there were 6% fewer households in 2030 due to lower immigration, there would be no reduction in household income at all (even assuming the Treasury are right that the economy would be 6.2% smaller in 2030 than it otherwise might have been).

The number of households in 2030 is projected to grow to 31.213 million. A 6% reduction in this forecast means 29.340 million households in the UK in 2030, an increase of 2.346 million households compared to today.

This means that even if household numbers grow by more than 2.3 million in the next fifteen years, the Treasury is forecasting no reduction in household incomes.

The report does not consider the benefits of striking free trade deals.

The report assumes the UK would strike no new free trade deals if we Vote Leave, despite this being one of the principal economic benefits of leaving the EU.

In 2015, the aggregate GDP of all the countries with which the EU had a trade agreement in force was $7.7 trillion.

By contrast, the aggregate GDP of all countries with which Chile had trade agreements was $58.3 trillion. The figure for South Korea was $40.8 trillion and that for Switzerland was $39.8 trillion.

The EU has failed to negotiate a free trade agreement with China. By contrast, both Iceland (which has a population of less than half a million) and Switzerland have negotiated free trade agreements with China.

The report downplays the savings from the UK’s budget contributions.

The report claims that the UK’s net contribution to the EU in 2014 was £5.71 billion.

The report admits that the contribution is a ‘significant economic obligation‘.

In 2014, (the last year for which data are available), the UK recorded a £12.3 billion balance of payments deficit with the EU institutions.

This is the net sum of money paid by the UK to the EU institutions in 2014. This money would be retained in the UK if we Vote Leave, cutting the current account deficit.

In addition, the UK would regain full control of the £19.1 billion we currently send to Brussels.

• Today, the Electoral Commission published details of donations and loans to the EU referendum campaigns.

• Just four donors to the Britain Stronger in Europe (BSE) campaign, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley and Citi, have had to pay a total of $27.7 billion to the US Government for their role in causing the global financial crisis in 2008.

• The US Government had stated that all of these banks contributed to the financial crisis by misselling toxic mortgages. Goldman Sachs also cooked the books to allow Greece to join the single currency.

• In 2015, the four banks spent collectively as much as €5.25 million lobbying the European Commission. Each bank spent at least €1 million.

• Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan were supportive of the UK’s entry into the single currency, as was Citi’s current Chief Economist who predicted Greece would leave the euro by 1 January 2013.

• Lloyds Bank Plc (which had to be bailed out by the taxpayer and was involved in the LIBOR) has lent the BSE campaign £20,000 at just 1% interest.

• The BSE campaign has also accepted donations from companies which are majority owned by foreign governments, companies based offshore, a company owned by a Russian oligarch linked to ‘a campaign of state-sponsored harassment’ and supporters of and donors to the pro-euro campaign fifteen years ago.

Commenting, former Labour Foreign Secretary Lord Owen said:

‘The EU works in the interests of the elite – the one per cent – so it is entirely unsurprising to find that the campaign to keep us in the Union is financed by big banks like Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan.

‘With their unlimited cash, they are lobbying the British people to act in a way that benefits their profit margin. Remember, these banks are the very people who crashed the economy in 2008 – misselling toxic mortgages, and cooking the books to allow Greece to join the single currency. Millions of ordinary people paid for their mistakes – and many are still suffering.

‘The truth is that Wall Street’s predatory habits have played an important, although little recognised, role in the Eurozone crisis. Yet, today, Goldman Sachs have the brass cheek to lecture us in the UK on why we should stay in an EU damaged and rendered virtually dysfunctional by the Eurozone crisis.

‘These figures show again that we are in a David vs Goliath fight, but it is one we are determined to win – for the good of the British people. They are the ones who pay the costs of uncontrolled migration – through lower wages, and unsustainable pressure on public services such as schools and hospitals. Now is the opportunity for them to strike back – and reclaim control of the £350 million we send to the EU every week, to spend it on their priorities instead.’

EU lobbying by BSE’s donors and the fines they paid for causing the financial crisis

The table summarises the amount spent by these giant banks on lobbying the EU, and the fines and settlements they made in reparation to the US Government for causing the financial crisis.

Source: European Commission, US Department of Justice.

Goldman Sachs campaigned for the single currency.

Peter Sutherland, Chief Executive of Goldman Sachs International sat on the Council of Britain in Europe, the failed campaign to scrap the pound and to ratify the European Constitution.

Mr Sutherland was a vocal supporter of the single currency: ‘[F]ormer European commissioner Peter Sutherland, who is now chairman of the investment bank Goldman Sachs International. Mr Sutherland said it had been a tragedy that Britain had stood apart during the early formative years of European integration and had often appeared to be a semi-detached participant in the process. “An opt-out from the single currency will exacerbate the impression and the reality of this detachment and inevitably will reduce the influence of Britain at a time of fundamental change both within Europe and globally,” he added. “It is surely essential that the United Kingdom should seek to advance its influence and the irony is that British influence over its own destiny in all economic areas, including currency, is enhanced rather than eroded by pooling sovereignty”‘ (Press Association, 12 November 1996).

Goldman Sachs cooked the books to allow Greece to join the euro.

‘Goldman Sachs helped the Greek government to mask the true extent of its deficit with the help of a derivatives deal that legally circumvented the EU Maastricht deficit rules. At some point the so-called cross currency swaps will mature, and swell the country’s already bloated deficit’.

Goldman Sachs was a major cause of the financial crisis.

In 2016, Goldman Sachs reached a settlement with the US Government under which it paid $5.06 billion ‘related to Goldman’s conduct in the packaging, securitization, marketing, sale and issuance of residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) between 2005 and 2007.

Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Benjamin C. Mizer said the bank was one ‘whose illegal conduct resulted in the financial crisis of 2008′.

Associate United States Attorney General Stuart F. Delery stated that the bank had committed ‘serious misconduct in falsely assuring investors that securities it sold were backed by sound mortgages, when it knew that they were full of mortgages that were likely to fail’.

Goldman Sachs spends millions lobbying the EU.

In 2015, Goldman Sachs spent between €1,000,000 and €1,249,999 lobbying the European Commission.

‘Goldman Sachs’ figures rose from €50,000 to between €700,000 and €799,999 in the same period [between 2013 and 2014]- a 14-fold hike’.

Goldman Sachs funds the lobbyist Nick Clegg to make pro-EU speeches.

Goldman Sachs paid pro-EU lobbyist Nick Clegg £22,500 to make a pro-EU speech in 2015 .

JPMorgan supported the single currency and claimed the risky option was to stay out.

The Vice Chairman, Investment Banking at JPMorgan, Lord Renwick of Clifton was a member of the Council of Britain in Europe, the failed campaign to scrap the pound and to ratify the European Constitution.

JPMorgan warned the UK could be left ‘isolated‘ outside the ‘single currency‘: ‘This time round, as the investment bank JP Morgan noted yesterday: “A ‘yes’ vote could leave the UK isolated as the only one of the 15 European Union members without a clear timetable for entry’… As the JP Morgan analysis notes, if that happened: “Investors are unlikely to react positively to the rejection of the single currency by a country that has been a member of the EU for 27 years, with a fixed exchange rate for 18 years’.

JPMorgan claimed that staying out of the ‘single currency’ would lead to banks relocating to the rest of the EU: ‘Despite all this, JP Morgan does not see “Project 1992” as the real threat to London. Potentially more dangerous is the distant prospect of a single currency and central bank. JP Morgan argues that financial business would be likely to gravitate to the place where such a central bank operated, although policy-making could be split from the operations – as the US Federal Reserve is divided between Washington and New York. At least JP Morgan reckons London has a fair claim to be the operating centre’ (Independent, 20 September 1988).

JPMorgan spends millions lobbying the Commission.

In 2015, JPMorgan spent between €1,250,000 and €1,499,999 lobbying the European Commission.

‘JP Morgan Chase says its lobbying costs in Brussels went up from €50,000 in 2013 to between €1,250,000 and €1,499,999 in 2014 – a 30-fold increase’.

JPMorgan was a major cause of the global financial crisis.

In November 2013, JPMorgan reached a $13 billion settlement with the Department of Justice ‘for Misleading Investors About Securities Containing Toxic Mortgages‘. ‘As part of the settlement, JPMorgan acknowledged it made serious misrepresentations to the public’.

The United States Attorney General Eric Holder said: ‘the conduct uncovered in this investigation helped sow the seeds of the mortgage meltdown’, and said JPMorgan had ‘knowingly bundle[d] toxic loans and [sold] them to unsuspecting investors‘.

Associate Attorney General Tony West said the bank ‘helped create a financial storm’ and that ‘the conduct JPMorgan has acknowledged – packaging risky home loans into securities, then selling them without disclosing their low quality to investors – contributed to the wreckage of the financial crisis‘.

JPMorgan pays for advice from pro-EU lobbyist Tony Blair.

Blair has been paid around £2 million per year as a part time adviser to JP Morgan.

Citi was a major cause of the global financial crisis.

In July 2014, Citigroup entered into a $7 billion settlement with the US Department of Justice ‘for Misleading Investors About Securities Containing Toxic Mortgages‘.

The US Attorney General, Eric Holder, said: ‘The bank’s activities contributed mightily to the financial crisis that devastated our economy in 2008‘.

Associate Attorney General Tony West said the bank had ‘a contributing role in creating the financial crisis‘.

Citi spends millions lobbying the EU.

In 2015, Citi spent between €1,000,000 and €1,249,999 lobbying the European Commission.

Citi’s chief economist was a fanatical advocate of the UK scrapping the pound and has made many false predictions in the past.

Citigroup’s Global Chief Economist is Willem H. Buiter.

In August 2002, Buiter co-wrote a paper entitled ‘Why Britain should join the euro‘. It argued that ‘Joining the euro would increase our incomes and thus our standard of living’.

Buiter also claimed remaining outside the single currency would ‘damage to London’s position as an international financial centre’ and lead to ‘second fiddle status in the political concert of Europe’ (The Independent, 3 July 1998, p. 19).

In May 2012, Citi predicted Greece would leave the eurozone by 1 January 2013.

Morgan Stanley played a major part in causing the global financial crisis.

In February 2016, Morgan Stanley paid a penalty of $2.6 billion to the US Government

Acting Associate Attorney General Stuart F. Delery said the bank had engaged in ‘misleading investors about the subprime mortgage loans underlying the securities it sold’

Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Benjamin C. Mizer said the bank was among ‘those who contributed to the financial crisis of 2008’ (US Department of Justice, 11 February 2016, link).

Morgan Stanley spent millions lobbying the EU.

In 2015, Morgan Stanley spent between €1,000,000 and €1,249,999 lobbying the European Commission.

Lloyds supported the Exchange Rate Mechanism and scrapping the pound.

Lloyds was a member of the Association for the Monetary Union of Europe, which was established ‘as a voice for Europe’s business community expressing the need for monetary stability and a single European currency’ (Investors Chronicle, 6 December 1991, p.14).

Lloyds called for the UK to rejoin the Exchange Rate Mechanism in 1993, as a prelude to scrapping the pound. Lloyds’ Chief Economist, Patrick Foley, claimed that: ‘It would make it easier and more attractive for countries such as Italy and the UK to rejoin the system… The advantage of rebuilding the ERM is that it would allow the EC to move towards a single currency which would make the operation of the European single market more effective’ (Press Association, 21 June 1993).

Mr Foley later claimed that: ‘Prices of goods would come down’ if the pound were scrapped and that ‘sovereignty over monetary policy would be a good thing for the British government to lose’ (Sunday Times, 4 February 1996).

More recently, Lloyds has warned against a referendum stating that it could lead to ‘uncertainty’.

Lloyds was heavily involved in the 2008 financial crisis and had to be bailed out to the tune of billions by the taxpayer.

In 2008, Lloyds/HBOS had to receive a Government bailout of £17 billion. The Government acquired a 40% stake in the bank.

As part of its efforts to recapitalise Lloyds Banking Group, the Government ended up acquiring 41% of Lloyds shares.

Lloyds was implicated in the LIBOR scandal in 2014 and was fined hundreds of millions for ‘manipulation’.

In July 2014, Lloyds was fined £218m for ‘serious misconduct‘ over the setting of interest rates in London.

The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission said that Lloyds manipulated the London interbank offered rate (Libor) for yen and sterling and tried to rig the rate for yen, sterling and the US dollar.

Other BSE donors

BSE have also accepted donations from the following questionable sources :

Lord Sainsbury of Turville (£2,581,954.00 declared today): Lord Sainsbury gave over £1 million to the Britain in Europe campaign in 2002.

Lord Bhattacharyya (£50,000.00 declared today): He donated an undisclosed sum in excess of £10,000 to Britain in Europe, the failed campaign to join the euro and ratify the single currency.

Eurostar (£7,508.50 declared today): the French Republic has a 55% stake in the rail company while the Belgian Government has a 5% stake.

Airbus Group Ltd (£7,508.50 declared today): Airbus supported joining the euro, arguing this was crucial for jobs.

Access Industries (not reported today) is the US-based vehicle of Len Blavatnik, who has been accused by a number of academics of having links to a group called Access-Alfa-Renova which ‘has long been accused of being behind a campaign of state-sponsored harassment‘.

Bet365 (not reported today): This company is located offshore, being based in Gibraltar. It has been reported that ‘new UK regulations which imply higher tax burdens are… likely to lie behind the move’.

Sir Mike Rake (not reported today): He was senior partner at KPMG when it donated an undisclosed sum to Britain in Europe, the failed campaign to join the euro and ratify the single currency. Rake publicly called on the Government to adopt the single currency (Daily Telegraph, 8 June 2001, p. 2).

Sir Roger Carr, Chairman of BAE Systems (not reported today): BAE Systems donated an undisclosed sum to Britain in Europe, the failed campaign to join the euro and ratify the single currency.

PwC (£7,508.50 declared today): PwC donated an undisclosed sum to Britain in Europe, the failed campaign to join the euro and ratify the single currency.

Roland Rudd (£32,508.50 declared today): He has claimed that there are ‘powerful arguments in favour of the return of the euro to the agenda’. Finsbury Group, of which Rudd is Chief Executive, also declared £7,508.50 today.

Jan du Plessis (not reported today), who has admitted that: ‘It has become painfully obvious that the countries in the eurozone are locked together in a straitjacket and that the founders of the single currency have thrown away the key. Of course, some would say they never intended to make keys available…. These economic imbalances, and the respective sets of cultural values that gave birth to them are, in my view, so intractable that it is very hard to see any solution that is truly sustainable over the long term’.