Analysis: Disarray in Leave campaigns are handing victory to Cameron

LEAVE.EU has described the Cameron-Tusk talks over Britain’s membership of the European Union as an “embarrassing spectacle” today. But it is the Leave campaign that faces the real embarrassment.

Not only are there rival leave campaigns in the shape of Leave.EU and Vote Leave that seem unable to set aside their differences to achieve their commonly held goal, but they also have their own internal tensions revealed last week with reports last week of an attempted coup at the top of Vote Leave.

Against this chaotic backdrop it is perhaps no surprise that the two groups have struggled to attract public endorsement from senior political figures. Even the most privately staunch Eurosceptic will hestitate to nail their coulours to the mast in public if they believe being shackled to a shambolic leave campaign will tarnish their longer term political career.

With the referendum date increasingly likely to be this year and perhaps as soon as June there is little time for the leave side of the debate to get their act together.

And pro-Europeans, Eurosceptics and the unsure alike should all hope it does.

Because the country should decide whether it stays or leaves in the EU based on the quality of the argument put forward by both sides, not because one camp failed to organise themselves.