Anti-immigration group, Identity Ireland has called on Irish people living in the UK to vote Leave in Thursday’s referendum. It has also promised to promote a similar campaign here to get Ireland to leave the European Union.

Identity Ireland, which says it has over 600 members and is in the final stages of registration as a political party, said that Irish people in the UK could prove critical in deciding the outcome of the Brexit vote.

“Your vote could be crucial in releasing your country from its current status - like Ireland- as a province of the Eurostate. Be thankful that you have politicians who are prepared to stand up and give leadership on this most crucial issue of your time,” said Identity Ireland.

“The UK will again gain control over its country and its borders,” it said. It added there would no longer be an “influx” of “millions” of immigrants that Angela Merkel “wants to offload on your country”.

In the statement, Identity Ireland went on to dismiss comments by Irish business leaders on the potential damaging effects of Brexit on the Irish economy as nothing more than scaremongering by the Irish establishment.

“Here in Ireland, all we hear is a cacophony from business leaders that our economy will suffer. Does that mean that all the computer companies and call-centres that come here to pay tuppence ha’penny corporation tax and employ foreign workers will up and go?

“The ‘economy’ that actually matters to the young Irish person looking to work and live in his own country is whether he can compete in a jobs market that is now flooded with cheap and compliant foreign workers, and that has to support a network of non-productive welfare tourists.

The group, which has invited the controversial German founder of the anti-Islamist group, Pegida, Lutz Bachmann to speak in Ireland this month, urged Irish people in the UK to pave the way for an Irish exit from Europe by voting for Britain to leave the European Union.