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DERMOT MURNAGHAN:  Well the Prime Minister has described his deal with the European Union as historic, securing special status he says for the United Kingdom.  The government has officially backed his plan although individual Ministers are now free to campaign against it.  Well I am joined now by Nicky Morgan, she is the Education Secretary and she is in her constituency in Loughborough and is of course supporting the Prime Minister.  Good morning to you Secretary of State, your side must be praying that Boris Johnson comes down on your side.

NICKY MORGAN:     Well good morning and this is about more than just obviously one person and I think having had the Cabinet Meeting yesterday, having had the deal the Prime Minister brought back from the EU, we are all looking forward now to getting on and making our respective cases and I’m looking forward to making the positive case for staying in the EU and obviously what Boris decides is going to be very much a matter for him.

DM: Yes, but are you bit annoyed with the way he seems to be handling all this, flirting with the out campaign, I don't know what he said to the Prime Minister, all the rest of you in the Cabinet have decided, you’ve made your positions clear.  

NICKY MORGAN:     We have and I think that was obviously reflected in the Cabinet meeting yesterday where people did set out their positions and I think that we’ve obviously had a chance over a number of weeks to think about our own personal positions, the cases that we want to make and that is why we’re looking forward now to getting out around the country and making that.  Look, Boris is one Member of Parliament, he’s the Mayor of London, he’ll make his decision known later on today and I personally think that actually people in the country will want to be knowing what is the case now.  That’s what my constituents are asking me, what is the case for remaining, what’s the case for leaving?  Let’s not just focus on one person, let’s focus on what is a really momentous decision for this country.

DM: Okay, I want to ask your constituents in a moment or two but a last one on Boris Johnson though, if he does come down for the leave side this is almost in effect – well it is – a leadership contest rolled in to a referendum as well.

NICKY MORGAN:     Well look, again I just think actually this is very much a Westminster bubble type approach to what is a huge decision for this country.  You know, it is something that we as a party pledged we would deliver in the election last year, we would have this in/out vote, we are now having this critical vote on 23rd June.  Other commentators will want to talk about leadership and who’s in and who’s out and all the rest of it but actually what I think people really want to hear about, people watching this morning, are the issues, the things they should be thinking about when they cast their votes on the 23rd June.

DM: But they are also listening to the leader of the country at the moment, do you think he could remain if the leave side win, could the Prime Minister stay on, could Mr Cameron remain as Prime Minister?

NICKY MORGAN:     Well absolutely and he’s made that very clear.  As I say, we had a very straightforward manifesto promise that we would deliver an in/out referendum on our future membership of the EU, that is being delivered on the 23rd June.  The Prime Minister has made it very clear that whatever the result, he is there to implement the will of the British people and that is exactly what he will be doing and that’s why we want to now focus on the issues of our membership, the terms of the deal that the Prime Minister has secured and worry less about personalities and more about the issues.

DM: Well let’s talk about the issues.  Your decision, were you always going to back the Prime Minister?  How conflicted have you been?  You can’t think that the EU is in any shape or form perfect?

NICKY MORGAN:     No, I certainly don’t think that the EU is perfect. Look, I was EU Budget Minister for a while, I went off and negotiated back in 2013, I think we are all very aware of the flaws of the EU and in the course of the last six months or so since the election, since negotiations really started to ramp up, I think that all of us around the Cabinet table, all Ministers, all Members of Parliament, have been thinking very hard about this.  For me personally my decision is particularly focused around issues of security and safety and the opportunities offered by the EU both for constituents, for my family but also actually as Education Secretary I spend my life encouraging young people to study foreign languages, to take advantage of the opportunities that our world offers us and the EU is a big part of that and that’s why I think we must remain a part of it.

DM: Coming to that decision, you mentioned there listening to your constituents, is your constituency association not in favour of leaving the European Union?

NICKY MORGAN:     Look, there are going to be individual members.  I am extremely lucky, I have a fabulous constituency, I have a lovely association and I’m sure we are going to have debates in the course of the next few months – obviously I represent a large and successful university here in Loughborough, I think the students there will want to engage in debate and I am looking forward to that.  To be honest with you actually, I have had more emails on other subjects other than the EU in the past few weeks.  I am sure that’s going to change now with all this coverage this weekend and over the next few weeks but I think one of the tasks for us, those of us who particularly want to remain, is going to be about engaging with the electorate, with people who might not actually be thinking about this as a decision, it doesn’t affect perhaps their daily lives and encourage them to think about those big issues and getting them to make sure that they do vote on 23rd June.

DM: But on the constituency associations, you will have heard the Prime Minister saying in the House of Commons, members should not take a view because of what their constituency association might say, people should do what is in their hearts.  So you are free to ignore whatever their views are.  

NICKY MORGAN:     Well you never ignore.  I have a very good relationship with my local party, I’ve been here in Loughborough since 2004, we’ve been campaigning alongside each other in elections after elections, finally winning the seat in 2010.  I’ve got to be honest with you, they are very balanced. I’ve had emails so far from members saying ‘Nicky, I’m really glad you are in the remain camp, how can I help?’ and others saying ‘Look, we’re going to disagree on this’ and that’s exactly what’s going to happen in the wider Conservative party.  I think that’s the right thing, I think it’s to the Prime Minister’s huge credit that actually we have got this opportunity now for people to campaign on both sides of the argument. People have had long and sincerely held views and now have the opportunity to vote in this in/out referendum which as I say is a clear delivery of a commitment we made in the election campaign last year.

DM: But of course you have said haven’t you that you wish you hadn’t listened so closely to your constituents on the issue of gay marriage.  You of course voted against it because you say of the number of contacts you got from your constituency, you say they were ten to one against it but now you’re saying you wished you hadn’t voted that way.

NICKY MORGAN:     Look, Members of Parliament are representatives of their constituents and we have a long held constitutional position, we are not delegates and we are there to make up our own minds as Members of Parliament and on this, because everyone is going to get a vote on the 23rd June whether they want to stay or whether they want to go, actually what I think as an MP is only one view in Loughborough.  There are 70 odd thousand people who will have the opportunity to say whether they want to stay or whether they want to go and I look forward to talking to them in the coming months but I’ve got to be honest with you, I’m not receiving a deluge of emails one way or the other and that’s why I think the next couple of months is so critical in terms of engaging with the electorate.

DM: Do you think people’s views will be changed by the nature of the campaigns?  Of course you are campaigning on the side which includes some real Euro enthusiasts.  We talked earlier about your reservations and experience of dealing with the European Union but you have got these real enthusiasts like Sir Danny Alexander there, Lord Mandelson, Roland Rudd and these are people who really have bought into the project, so to speak.

NICKY MORGAN:     Of course there are going to be people who are very enthusiastic.  I think people will want to air the views and the reasons for staying and as I say, for me personally it’s about safety, it’s about security, it’s about being part of a much bigger world. I think Britain is an outward facing nation, we benefit from being part of a single market with access to 500 million people and sharing information about our security and issues around terrorism for example, being able to wield influence on the world stage through what I think being part of the EU brings for us and it’ll be up to all of us in the campaign to make our own cases when we are out and about talking to people, whether it’s in our own constituencies, whether it’s on the media, whether it’s to other audiences.  

DM: I mean a lot of people are going to be saying to you, it’s already been said before the campaign proper started hasn’t it, about the issue of migration – migration from within the European Union, the 500 million people or so eligible to come without any restrictions to the UK.  Do you think that the Prime Minister’s emergency brake on in-work benefits, on child benefits, do you think that will cut migration?

NICKY MORGAN:     Well we do absolutely think that that will have an effect, there’s no doubt about it, that our benefits system is what’s recognised in the deal documents that were agreed on Friday night, does recognise that the benefits system that we have in this country is one of the factors that encourages people to come here.  I think we know that 40% of newly arrived migrants to the UK are claiming benefits so having that emergency brake, those changes to the level of child benefits that can be sent home, will be hugely important but I think that you are right, migration is going to be one of the big debates.  We have already seen that this morning, the issues around free movement of people and I think I’d make two points on that.  Firstly it works both ways in the sense that we benefit from people coming here and I see that again in my own local area, companies with their employees from overseas but also people from this country go and benefit by working elsewhere in the EU too.  People do want us to have control, that’s what we do have because we are not part of the Schengen area and if anybody thinks that just by leaving we are going to somehow not have to accept people, there will be no free movement of people then frankly I think that that’s just deluded because that’s not what’s going to happen if we were to EU, we can see that already with issues of membership with countries like Norway and Iceland.  

DM: You talk about a civilised debate and delusions there because some of your Cabinet colleagues now are saying they don’t think the emergency brake will cut migration at all, far more of the so-called pull factor will be the Chancellor’s national living wage, that that’s going to draw more people in.

NICKY MORGAN:     Well again I think I would say two things on that.  Firstly, the national living wage only applies to employees over the age of 25 and what we see is a lot of our EU migration is people under the age of 25 who come to this country and look for jobs.  The second thing, as I say there are lots of attractions in our labour market, the opportunities that this country offers, this is a great country and we have as a government put the economy back on its feet, we are creating more jobs, inevitably people are going to want to come here and the point is that it’s that free movement of workers. We want people to come here, to work, not to come here because of the benefits and that’s why the deal that has been secured by the Prime Minister is so important.

DM: Secretary of State, thank you very much indeed for joining us, Nicky Morgan the Education Secretary there.