ANY QUOTES USED MUST BE ATTRIBUTED TO MURNAGHAN, SKY NEWS

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Completely untrue, that is the government’s response to claims that British diplomats have been considering a deal to allow more than a million Turkish citizens visa free travel to the United Kingdom.  Turkey has of course become a regular theme of the Out campaign which has claimed that the prospect of Turkey joining the European Union could pose amongst other things a security threat to Britain.  I am joined now by the former Defence Secretary and Leave campaigner, Liam Fox and a very good morning to you. I’ve just had Nick Clegg on and I know you passed each other on your way in here and he said forget Project Fear, your side and on this issue is one of them, is Project Fib.  

LIAM FOX: I think the amazing difference that has come out in the referendum now is that on the Leave side we’ve been talking about the controls that we could get back, control of making our own laws, control of our own borders, control of our own money and all we are getting from the Remain side is this dark vision of Britain having no future unless its hand is being held by the European Union.

DM: But hold on, just on this specific charge, you have got a dark vision, your side and Nigel Farage and others, a dark vision of millions of Turks coming in to the United Kingdom.  

LIAM FOX: Well if you have free movement which we have as part of our European Union membership, and of course the Prime Minister didn’t even attempt to get any change to that during the renegotiation, and you have an enlargement of Europe, of course the problem will get bigger.  This is one of the issues here.  

DM: Visa free travel, this story at the front of the Sunday Times that they found civil servants discussing the issue of a million Turks somehow getting into the United Kingdom, being able to enter the United Kingdom.  

LIAM FOX: Well it doesn’t matter exactly which people are coming in, the fact is we have got no control over it and you can make arguments for and against immigration but at the moment, as far as Europe is concerned, we have no ability to control the numbers coming in and if you have an uncontrolled number, it is just common sense, if you have the population rising at the rate it has been rising in recent years, we have added three million to our population in the last decade, we will continue to do that at current rates of immigration, that puts a lot of pressure on things like GP services and of course as a former GP myself I can see the pressure on that.  It puts pressure on school places, on local authorities planning housing, it’s just about getting control.  You can argue that there should be more or that there should be fewer, the question is where does that control happen?  In my view that control should be with the British people and the British government and not the European Commission.

DM: Well let me ask you about another former GP, Sarah Wollaston, of course who has crossed sides, left the Leave campaign to join the Remain side because she said she can’t really put up with these fibs, this £350 million a week that we give to the European Union and things like that.  

LIAM FOX: Well I find it rather odd that you would make a constitutional decision about the future of the country on one particular slogan but there is no doubt about the fact that we give a large amount of money to the European Union that we never get back, we give about £10 billion more a year to the European Union a year than we get back from them, that’s money that we could be spending …

DM: But that’s £350 million a week though.  

LIAM FOX: That is £350 million a week we give to the European Union of which we have no control over what they spend …

DM: £350 million a week is £17.5 billion.  

LIAM FOX: That’s a gross figure, that is what we give to the European Union, we can neither control what they spend and we don’t get any of that net sum back.  There is a £10 billion gap.  If you take the NHS for example, the NHS is running a deficit of about £2.5 billion this year so what we are actually contributing is more than three times, well more than three times.  

DM: But it’s not as simple as that, do you accept the arguments being made again today by the Prime Minister that because the overall size of the economy they predict would shrink, whatever you do if you get that however many billions back, it’s as nothing in a shrinking economy?  You can spend less on public services including the NHS.  

LIAM FOX: One, it’s a guess, it’s an assertion, you make this assertion that we will have an economic Armageddon if we leave the European Union, that’s a guess.  Their predictions, let’s face it, haven’t been that great, the Treasury didn’t get our deficit right between October and the spring so how they can predict this far in advance I’m not at all sure.  What is clear is that we know that if we leave  that we’ll not be sending that money to the European Union every year, we know that that’s a fact.  We know that it’s a fact that we will be able to make decisions about immigration for ourselves, we know it’s a fact that we’ll be able to make our own laws, that’s the difference.  I think the Leave campaigners are setting out a series of choices for future governments that simply wouldn’t be possible if we remain in the EU and this Project Fear that it will take us closer to war in Europe, it will bring genocide closer and you will lose your bus pass as well is just getting ridiculous and the public are totally tuned out of this.

DM: We’ve got less on pensions, less on defence, less on the NHS and as you say bus passes today, how much damage do you think Mr Cameron is doing to his own standing within the Conservative party?  

LIAM FOX: I think it’s when you start to lose credibility it is very hard to government it back and the more hyperbolic that the Remain campaign become and the darker the visions of the future, I find just talking to voters around the country the less credible it is because what they want to hear from the Remain side is okay then, why should we stay in the European Union?  What is it about the European project, why do you think that the European court should be able to overrule the UK parliament, what are the things about European joint defence that you think are good, what about the plans to harmonise our company laws and our property laws, why do you think they are good things?  Because they will not make a defence of the European Union because they know that this referendum campaign is based upon a profound untruth and the untruth is that there is a reformed EU to be part of but there is no reformed EU.  

DM: But the damage within the party during that ITV debate last week, clearly Amber Rudd was sanctioned to have a go at Boris Johnson, very personal attacks.  

LIAM FOX: I dislike that sort of personal attack and I think that it’s perfectly okay to say we think you’re wrong, we don’t think you understand he arguments, we think you’ve got your facts incorrect but to start impugning the motives or the integrity or the honesty of our colleagues can only lead to long term damage and I think it is a sign of panic that has set in in the Remain campaign that they have done this. Attacking individuals in the way that there was an attack on Boris Johnson, had it been a Euro match it would have been a red card offence for a professional foul, that sort of thing doesn’t help us and actually I don't think it helps the Remain campaign, I think it makes the public say you look desperate, you are personalising the attacks, why don’t you stick to the issues?  Is it because you are afraid to debate them?  

DM: But didn’t she have a point about Boris Johnson’s personal ambition now that he’s admitted that he has been having discussions with other MPs about what happens to David Cameron after the vote?  

LIAM FOX: Oh you think Tory MPs don’t have ambitions for the Tory leadership? I mean come off it.  The important thing is here that we stick to the issues, the public want to know will they address the issues in this referendum that actually matter to them, about our future security, what will happen if we’ve got uncontrolled migration, what will happen to our public services, what happens to our money.  They really couldn’t care less about the internal debating society about the Tory party’s future leadership, they want us to concentrate on the big issues and every time the Remain campaign try to divert attention away from our laws, our borders and our money onto will it be Boris Johnson, will it be Michael Gove, it just makes them look as if they are …

DM: So you are not saying that those discussions then aren’t taking place?  Boris Johnson has admitted talking to one MP about the mechanism for removing David Cameron, are you saying that those discussions are taking place within the Conservative party?

LIAM FOX:  I have no idea who Boris Johnson talks to and do you know what, I couldn’t care less.  What I care about is between now and the 23rd June is getting people to focus on the fact that if we weren’t already in the European Union would we be choosing to join it on the 23rd, that’s the big choice because if you wouldn’t choose to join it today but you choose to remain you are in fact joining it for future generations.  That’s the big constitutional issue.  Do you know what, there will be lots of time to discuss Tory party leadership in the years ahead after this referendum.  

DM: But it is being discussed, it is being discussed now and you know it.  How minded would you be to consider signing this letter that requires 50 Conservative MPs to spark a leadership campaign?

LIAM FOX: I’ve been very clear including to the Prime Minister that I think that irrespective of the result the Prime Minister needs to continue to provide us with a period of political stability.  I think our duty is to give the country stability and of course this is not a general election we’re having, it’s a referendum, it’s a simple question that the public are being asked to consider and it’s not a consultation, it’s an instruction to government and if we are democrats we have to accept the verdict of the people.  

DM: But could you envisage a second referendum if you got the result you wanted, you got a narrow leave vote, a second referendum on the form then of association that the United Kingdom has with the European Union?

LIAM FOX: No, I think it is very clear, the public are being asked to either remain in the European Union or to leave the European Union.  I think our future is much more in our own hands, we have more control if we decide to leave and of course the government will still be there and in my view to carry out the instruction that the public have given them in a referendum and any democrat who says that they are not going to accept the result of that referendum to second guess the electorate, I think that would be a democratic outrage.  

DM: Liam Fox, good to see you, thank you very much indeed.