To explain briefly, the left hand side (blue) is the pro-EU Yes side; the right hand side is the anti-EU No side.

The further right or left one goes, the more one finds committed voters who need no persuasion. But you also find extremes that are likely to put off the mass of middling voters.

So if there is any sense left in the world, we will probably hear no one in the Yes camp sounding off about voting Yes “to create a wonderful new country called Europe, where democracy needs to be bypassed for the common good, and where we need to eventually join the euro”. Equally it would be nice to think that we would hear nobody on the No side sounding off about voting No “to stop a muslim invasion” [my apologies to any muslims reading, but this stuff appears from time to time, especially on Twitter].

Such people need to be muzzled. They are going to repel most voters in the so-called centre ground.

And that’s where this will be fought: in the centre ground as defined in the picture above. It means accepting that the British genuinely like the idea of a larger market and of a level of engagement with the European continent. We are an even-tempered bunch so we also don’t like revolution. If we are going to leave the EU, it isn’t going to be done in a grand way but in a relatively understated way: easing out in a way that doesn’t frighten the horses i.e. maintains the single market through an EEA arrangement.

That does however put the centre ground Outers in potential conflict with those Outers on the right who are trying to stop/manage immigration. Wanting the single market and wanting to “control our borders” are incompatible. But:

a) One has to realise that there are ways of managing immigration even within the EU (and more so within the EEA). UK governments just haven’t done so to date.

b) Bluntly, do the Outers on the right want to give up EU membership or not?

There are people in the space occupied by mildly pro-EU ‘Sceptic Tory MPs’ [a little ill-defined, I admit] and even ‘Fresh Start Tory MPs’ who are only there because they fear the much-alleged loss of influence from being in an EEA/single market position. But that’s where they would ideally want to be “if it were possible”. Even David Cameron has said “We want the common market, we want the trade and the co-operation, not the country called Europe.”

Therefore the No campaign needs to take up a position that appeals to people, MPs, and businesses by showing that very little changes at the moment of Brexit, and that the Brexit landscape is actually what they wanted all along but may not have thought possible. The campaign needs to stress the single market and the benefits of moving to such position outside the EU (including the economic neutrality of doing so), and also sketch out a longer term vision beyond that position. The campaign also needs to relentlessly attack the ‘loss of influence’ argument and stress the fact that the EEA is but a step in a long journey. Many Yes ‘foxes’ will be slain.

In parallel, we can and should also be pointing out that staying in the EU will not maintain the status quo but will push the UK ultimately into a new country called Europe. That will mean repeating the words of various federalists over the years whose rhetoric has been rather frightening to British ears. This will push the Yes camp back into their space in order to defend it. But bear in mind they will be doing something similar: goading Farage and UKIP to come out and say things that divert the central moderate No message. That’s why Farage needs to take a backseat and UKIPers need to put away their colours and campaign as individuals (or in a small number of cases, just go away and say nothing).

Then we might just have a chance of winning.