UK's EU vote campaign set to start with Cameron reeling

THE United Kingdom's "in-out" EU (European Union) referendum campaign officially kicks off this week with opinion surveys showing the June 23 ballot remains on a knife-edge. The latest "poll of polls" tracker from The Financial Times shows an aggregated 43 to 41 per cent lead for the "remain" camp, with a sizeable chunk of the population still undecided, underlining precisely how tight the vote may be.

Should UK voters ultimately choose to leave the EU, it will likely force Prime Minister David Cameron's resignation given his leadership of the "remain" campaign. So he is fighting for his political life as he now intensifies efforts to sell the benefits of continued EU membership to the populace.

The official start point for the referendum this week comes during perhaps the most troubled time of Mr Cameron's six-year premiership. Most recently, he has been ensnared in the Panama papers revelations and admitted on April 7 he held shares in the Blairmore Investment Trust from 1997 to January 2010, shortly before he became prime minister. Mr Cameron's declaration was the fifth separate explanation in only four days of his financial affairs. While he hopes this latest pronouncement will draw a line in the sand over the issue, especially as he will reportedly publicly release his tax returns too later this month, there will in fact be significant further scrutiny of this issue.