The shadow chancellor, John McDonnell, is joining forces with the former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis to make the “radical” case for the UK to remain in the European Union, after both sides of the referendum campaign were criticised for making misleading and overly negative arguments.
Varoufakis, the far-left economist who fought against the EU’s proposed bailout of Greece last year, will join McDonnell and the Green party MP, Caroline Lucas, on Saturday for the start of a tour to persuade leftwingers to vote to stay in the EU.
The senior figures from the political left are teaming up as part of the Another Europe is Possible campaign, in which they will make a progressive case for Britain to remain in the union. Speaking on Saturday, Varoufakis said: “The two campaigns are infantilising voters in a rather cynical and astonishing fashion. We on the other hand rely on investing in reasoned debate.”
On Friday Vote Leave, Britain Stronger in Europe and the Treasury were all accused of misleading voters in a report by a cross-party House of Commons committee.
In a 83-page report, the Treasury committee particularly criticised the leave camp’s “deeply problematic” assertion that exiting the EU would save £350m a week that could be spent on the NHS, because it said that was a gross figure that made no allowance for the rebate and for EU contributions to the UK. The net figure would be about £110m a week, it said.
The committee also said Britain Stronger in Europe campaign’s claim that the cost of imports could rise by at least £11bn in the event of Brexit was implausible and that its suggestion that 3m jobs are dependent on EU membership was “misleading”.
Many voters have expressed dismay at the negativity of the campaigns on both sides. The first of a series of televised debates, which aired on the BBC this week, included several complaints from the audience that leave and remain campaigners had relied on “fear” tactics to encourage support.
Meanwhile, writing in the Guardian on Saturday, the celebrity chef Delia Smith has said the debate has become “a fierce battleground in the direct line of fire of some vicious rhetoric”.
In an opinion piece for the Guardian before the leftwing event, Varoufakis writes: “We may come from different backgrounds, political organisations and nations. John McDonnell, Caroline Lucas and I may harbour different perspectives on the EU. But, as our joint declaration affirms, we stand united in our belief that a democratic, prosperous Britain can only be won in the context of a pan-European struggle to democratise the EU.”
Varoufakis was severely critical of the EU’s dealings with Greece’s debts when he was finance minister but has recently warned that Brexit could plunge Europe into a 1930s-style depression.
He says Brexit is not the answer to the three issues important to Britain – sovereignty, the regulatory over-reach of Brussels and the strain that unchecked migration from poorer EU countries places on public services such as health and education.
“The reason public services are failing is the rolling austerity that cloaks a vicious class war against Britain’s poor; a war that would have happened even if the UK border were hermetically sealed,” Varoufakis writes.
“Progressives must make a judgment call: do they believe that something good may come out of the collapse of our reactionary, undemocratic EU? Or will its collapse plunge the continent into an economic and political vortex that no Brexit can shield Britain from?
“Our view is clear. And it is the reason we stand together in urging an in vote in the context of a radical surge of democracy from Britain to Greece, and from Portugal to the Baltics.”
Speaking from his party’s Labour In for Britain campaign bus on Friday, Jeremy Corbyn described the European Central Bank’s treatment of Greece as “quite disgraceful”.
He said: “I have remained very critical of the eurozone’s policy towards Greece. Indeed, I had a very long meeting with [the Greek PM] Alexis Tsipras and others from his delegation when they were in London a couple of months ago and we discussed the need for an anti-austerity alliance across Europe.”
The Labour leader said that remaining in the EU would leave a future Labour government more able to influence European economic policy. “I want us to go down the line of an investing and expanding economy, not creating greater economic differences between member states in Europe. Because clearly poverty in Greece has increased more than anywhere else,” he said.
“In Europe, as a Labour government, I would be a voice against austerity, a voice for economic growth and a voice for social justice across the whole continent.”
The Another Europe is Possible tour started at the UCL Institute of Education in central London on Saturday. Momentum, the Labour-supporting network, also joined Corbyn in launching a platform called Your Referendum to boost grassroots campaigning for remain.
A vote by Momentum’s national committee, a poll of Momentum’s supporters and a YouGov poll of Corbyn-supporting Labour members have all overwhelmingly backed remain.
Momentum said Your Referendum was inspired by the US presidential candidate Bernie Sanders’ campaigning methods of providing tools for volunteer-led organising.
In a statement, the group said: “Your Referendum is Momentum’s effort to take the toxic Brexit debate out of Westminster and the TV studios and into our communities, with the hope of reaching leftwing and younger voters, who polls say are less likely to turn out although they tend to support remain.”
The national organiser for Momentum, James Schneider, said: “Through the Your Referendum platform and the activities of local Momentum groups, we hope to encourage more activism, engage more people actively in the EU debate, and mobilise the harder to reach young or leftwing voters, who are turned off by Stronger In’s defence of the status quo.”
Other rallies as part of the tour will involve trade unionists and the Labour MP Clive Lewis at cities including Bristol, Birmingham, Sheffield and Manchester.
Corbyn was joined by his predecessor Ed Miliband at a rally in Doncaster on Friday, where he said mainstream media coverage of the EU referendum debate had focused too much on Tory party divisions, while the Labour party’s argument for a more “social Europe” had been getting through to people on social media.
Miliband said Corbyn’s Eurosceptic past put him in a good position to persuade Eurosceptic Labour voters.
“I think the very fact that he has expressed in the past some doubts about the European Union actually makes him a more compelling advocate for the remain position,” the Doncaster MP said.
“The fact that he’s had those doubts, but has decided that the right decision is to stay in, is actually where quite a lot of the country is.”
While some within the remain campaign have been worried that leftwingers could be tempted to vote out because of long-held views that the EU is in hock to corporate interests and wedded to the free market, it is hoped that they will be convinced by politicians like McDonnell and Corbyn, who has changed his position over the years from voting against joining the common market in 1975.
Another Europe is Possible said hundreds of people had already signed up to the events and it expected to mobilise thousands of activists across the UK.