Farage Slams ‘Dave’s Deal’

UK Independence Party (UKIP) leader Nigel Farage on Friday said the agreement on Prime Minister David Cameron’s demands for EU reforms at a key summit in Brussels was “not worth the paper it’s written on”.

“This deal that he’s done does not address the fundamental issues that people care about,” Farage told an audience of around 1,500 people at a pro-Brexit campaign event in central London.

“Dave’s deal is not worth the paper that it’s written on,” he told cheering supporters, shortly after news broke that there had been an agreement in Brussels.

Some well-known eurosceptic MPs also turned out for the event, as British media reported that justice minister Michael Gove and five other ministers were preparing to pledge support for the “Leave” camp.

“This is a historic moment. This is the moment when we fight back,” said Bill Cash, a lawmaker and veteran anti-EU campaigner in Cameron’s Conservative Party.

“We have gone further and further forward and deeper and deeper into this morass of legislation, this increasingly offensive system which we now have to leave,” he told the meeting.

Fellow Conservative MP David Davis said it was time for Britain “to take control of its own destiny”.

The event was organised by the Grassroots Out movement, which unites several anti-EU groups.

The BBC and the Independent meanwhile reported that Gove, a close Cameron ally, was preparing to declare his backing for the “Leave” campaign.

The Independent said he and at least five other ministers would do the same following a cabinet meeting to be chaired by Cameron on Saturday.

Much of the media attention remains on the intentions of Mayor of London Boris Johnson — a popular politician who has expressed eurosceptic views.

Johnson met with Cameron at the prime minister’s 10 Downing Street residence on Wednesday but left saying: “I’ll be back. No deal”.