Boris Johnson's chilling threat to ITV: You'll face 'consequences' for excluding us from TV debates

Vote Leave has accused ITV of 'lying' over its plans to invite Mr Farage to take part in the debate

Oliver Wright

Political Editor

Thursday 12 May 2016 05:59 EDT

Comments

Ukip leader Nigel Farage has been invited onto the debate instead a representative from Vote Leave (Reuters)

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Britain’s main commercial broadcaster has been warned by the official Leave campaign that it faces “consequences for its future” after scheduling a debate between Nigel Farage and David Cameron in the run-up to the EU referendum.

In an extraordinary statement issued late last night Vote Leave accused ITV of “lying” over its plans to invite Mr Farage to take part in the debate instead of Michael Gove or Boris Johnson.

They suggested ITV News’ respected political editor Robert Peston was biased in favour of the EU and accused the organisation of “secretly stitching up a deal” with Downing Street.

“ITV has effectively joined the official IN campaign,” said a Vote Leave statement to journalists.

“There will be consequences for its future - the people in No10 won't be there for long.”

This morning a spokesman for Vote Leave refused to back down from the threat of “consequences” for ITV but refused to say what they might be.

Mr Cameron is widely expected to be forced to resign if he fails to win the referendum with Mr Johnson most likely to take his place. He will now be under pressure to say what those “consequences” might be.

The row started after ITV announced it was going to hold an hour-long live programme on June 7 in which David Cameron and Nigel Farage would in turn answer questions from a studio audience of around 200 people.

Mr Farage and David Cameron will take it in turns to make their pitches to the nation before answering audience questions (Dan Kitwood/Getty)

While Mr Farage is perhaps the most prominent anti-EU campaigner in the country he is not directly connected to Vote Leave the officially designated anti EU campaign group run by Mr Johnson and Mr Gove.

But Downing Street are determined that Mr Cameron is not seen directly debating his fellow Tory colleagues as they fear that would enflame internal tensions in the party – and could backfire on the Remain campaign.

What to believe about the EU referendum

Vote Leave campaigners fear that ITV agreed to Mr Farage appearing in order to get the Prime Minister to take part.

In an extraordinary statement issued last night to media organisations they wrote: “They (Downing Steet) are fixing the debates to shut out the official campaign.

“ITV is led by people like Robert Peston who campaigned for Britain to join the euro. ITV has lied to us in private while secretly stitching up a deal with Cameron to stop Boris Johnson or Michael Gove debating the issues properly. ITV has effectively joined the official IN campaign and there will be consequences for its future - the people in No10 won't be there for long.”

But Nigel Farage's Spokesman accused Vote Leave of running a campaign designed to exlude the Ukip leader from taking a role in the debate.

“Once again sadly we see Vote Leave seeking to exclude Nigel Farage and UKIP from this referendum campaign,” he said.

The Vote Leave campaign has said it wants Michael Gove to talk part in the debates instead (Reuters)

“It is deeply disappointing that rather than rallying behind Nigel Farage for what will be the biggest one-on-one debate of the referendum campaign, Vote Leave are instead threatening court action to stop Nigel from taking on the Prime Minister.

"All on the Leave side must put their egos to one side and support Nigel as he prepares to take on the Prime Minister in what will undoubtedly be the defining moment of the referendum campaign."

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