'Best Days Ahead' After Brexit, Gove Says

Out campaigner Michael Gove has set out his "optimistic" vision for how the UK would look if it votes to leave the EU.

In a speech in London, the justice secretary said: "One of the most striking things about the debate on Britain's future relationship with Europe is that the case for staying is couched overwhelmingly in negative and pessimistic terms, while the case for leaving is positive and optimistic.

"Those of us who want to leave believe that Britain's best days lie ahead, that our country has tremendous untapped potential which independence would unleash."

Warning of "bogeymen" dreamt up by the Remain campaign, he mocked their predictions for the UK outside of the EU.

"The City of London would become a ghost town, our manufacturing industries would be sanctioned more punitively than even communist North Korea, decades would pass before a single British Land Rover or Mr Kipling cake could ever again be sold in France and in the meantime our farmers would have been driven from the land by poverty worse than the Potato Famine," he joked.

"To cap it all, an alliance of Vladimir Putin, Marine Le Pen and Donald Trump, emboldened by our weakness, would, like some geopolitical equivalent of the Penguin, Catwoman and the Joker, be liberated to spread chaos worldwide and subvert our democracy."

He also attacked a Treasury report, produced by George Osborne, which claimed the typical UK household will be £4,300 a year worse off by 2030 if we leave the EU.

"Yesterday's report from the Treasury is an official admission from the In campaign that if we vote to stay in the EU then  immigration will continue to increase by hundreds of thousands year on year.

"As long as we are in the EU we cannot control our borders and cannot develop an immigration policy which is both truly humane and in our long term economic interests."

He also pointed out that warnings about not being part of the euro were unfounded, and that similar warnings about leaving the EU would be proved to be incorrect.

"We were told before when the single currency was being established, London would shrivel and die if we were outside the single currency.

"If we are outside the European Union but part of a free-trade zone, the ingenuity, the energy and attractiveness of London as a financial capital, will ensure our financial services continue to thrive."

One journalist in the audience asked whether Mr Gove was offended by Mr Osborne describing some Brexit campaigners as economically illiterate.

He replied: "No, George has called me much worse in private and in public."

Meanwhile, new additions to the Remain campaign emerged - with both the National Farmers' Union (NFU) and the Royal College of Midwives (RCM) backing the argument to stay in the EU.

The NFU said: "On the balance of existing evidence available to us at present, the interests of farmers are best served by our continuing membership of the European Union."

Cathy Warwick, from the Royal College of Midwives, said that being in EU provides benefits for pregnant women.

"From the point of view of pregnant women (they) are, through EU regulations, guaranteed time off to attend antenatal appointments and that time off is paid," she said.

A new NUS survey also suggests students overwhelmingly support Britain staying in the EU - some 76% backing the Remain campaign, with just 14% in favour of Brexit.

Bank of England governor Mark Carney also warned that a vote to leave the EU may result in an extended period of uncertainty about the economic outlook.

The director of the European Union's law enforcement agency Europol said on Tuesday that a decision to leave would involve serious security consequences.

Rob Wainwright said: "If you put at risk any part of the framework for international police cooperation and intelligence sharing, that Britain currently relies on then there clearly is potential for consequences."

:: Using Sky Data we have come up with a list of the places in the UK most likely to vote to stay or to leave the EU.

People living in district of Tendring - which includes Clacton-on-Sea - are most likely to vote for Brexit.

Our correspondents are spending the day in the three European towns it is twinned with - Valence in France, Biberach in South West Germany, and Swidnica in Poland.