‘Remain’ dodges a hammer blow from the European Court of Justice

‘Remain’ might be trailing in the polls, but the campaign can at least be grateful they haven’t been dealt another hammer blow by the European Court of Justice today. The European Commission had tried to claim that the UK Government was wrong to check whether those getting child benefits were allowed to live in the country before paying out. But thankfully for ‘Remain’, the ECJ ruled that it was legal to hold back money for unemployed EU migrants who were not allowed to be here. The good news for ‘Remain’ is that the decision didn’t go the other way. Given how momentum has increasingly shifted towards ‘Leave’, particularly after yesterday ICM phone poll put the chances of Brexit five points ahead of ‘Remain’, such a decision would have been disastrous. It would have been made worse by the fact that tighter restrictions on benefits for migrants was part of the PM’s renegotiation.