CBI protest: the Out campaign won't win by rebelling

"It was the most terrifying thing I've ever done in my life but definitely worthwhile," Peter Lyon, one of the Eurosceptic protestors who interrupted David Cameron's speech on Europe to business lobby group the CBI, told Sky News this morning. In an intervention which looked a bit more fun—though no less nerdy—than most student politics, he and Phil Sheppard from anti-EU university group Students for Britain chanted "CBI: voice of Brussels" until they were escorted out by security. Most of their contemporaries across the nation were probably still in bed at the time, eating a cold Rustlers burger and watching their third consecutive episode of American Horror Story on Netflix, so hats off to them. But new YouGov polling for Prospect, to be released in our December issue this Thursday, suggests that this may not be the most effective strategy for eurosceptic campaigners.

More interesting than the protest itself was its provenance. Vote Leave, the most respected of the major campaigns to take Britain out of the EU, helped organise their stunt by setting up a company called Lyon Sheppard Web Solutions, allowing them access to the event. One of the campaign's leaders, former Michael Gove advisor Dominic Cummings, has since defended the action on Twitter, responding to criticism from a Telegraph journalist with: "You think this is nasty you ain't seen nuthin [sic] yet... Establishment in crosshairs" But is this sort of direct action a helpful strategy for Out campaigners?

Our polling shows that leaving the EU is still seen as much more risky than staying in. That suggests that, while voters tell pollsters they are split on the question of Britain's membership, those who say they want to leave may just be giving the establishment a bit of a kicking. The fear for Out campaigners is that, as the referendum gets closer and voters become more aware of the consequences of their choice, they will start to worry about the risk of leaving and swing, however reluctantly, to the In side. Those who want us to leave Europe need to counteract this impression, especially given that staying In is the status quo, usually the choice of uncertain electors in a referendum. On that basis, having the public associate you with banner-waving young firebrands may not be the best move.

Many Eurosceptics understand the need to assuage voters' fears about Brexit. Cummings himself argued on Twitter today that "Out" could be construed as the safer option: "Is it safer to keep giving away power and money or to take it back? Focus group common sense says?!" Talking up the "Five Presidents' Report," a plan for greater European integration in areas like banking released in June, is sometimes mentioned by Eurosceptics as a way of persuading the public that staying in would also reflect a risky change to the status quo, as it would eventually lead to more integration.

But these are relatively nuanced arguments, and voters sometimes deal more in images—just ask Ed Miliband and his bacon sandwich. Today's excitable students, and David Cameron's calmly disapproving response to them, could become one such defining image. If Euroscepticism is seen as the preserve of radical dissidents, then however much voters sympathise with the Out campaign's anti-establishment leanings, they might decide on the day to play it safe and keep our relationship with the continent intact.