LONDON, (Reuters) – Prime Minister David Cameron promised Britons a vote on quitting the European Union, rattling London’s biggest allies and some investors by raising the prospect of uncertainty and upheaval.
Cameron announced yesterday that the referendum would be held by the end of 2017 – provided he wins a second term – and said that while Britain did not want to retreat from the world, public disillusionment with the bloc was at “an all-time high”.
“It is time for the British people to have their say. It is time for us to settle this question about Britain and Europe,” Cameron said in a speech, adding that his Conservative party would campaign for the 2015 parliamentary election on a promise to renegotiate the terms of Britain’s EU membership.
“When we have negotiated that new settlement, we will give the British people a referendum with a very simple in or out choice to stay in the European Union on these new terms; or come out altogether. It will be an in-out referendum.”
A referendum would mark the second time British voters have had a direct say on the issue. In 1975, they decided by a wide margin to stay in, two years after the country had joined.
Most recent opinion polls have shown a slim majority would vote to leave amid bitter disenchantment, fanned by a hostile press, about the EU’s perceived influence on the British way of life. However, a poll this week showed a majority for staying.
