Nick Clegg: Leaving EU would make UK 'less safe'

The Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has rejected the former chancellor Lord Lawson's call for Britain to leave the European Union.

Lord Lawson said the economic benefits of leaving would outweigh the costs and that he would vote for the UK to leave if a referendum was held.

But speaking to the Today programme's Justin Webb, Mr Clegg said that while the EU was in need of constant reform, Britain was better in than out: "I think leaving the European Union would make us less safe because we cooperate in the European Union to go after criminal gangs that cross borders. It makes us less prosperous."

"It jeopardises potentially up to three million jobs that are dependant on our place in what is after all the world's largest borderless single market," he added.

"It means it's more difficult to deal with cross border threats like climate change. I also think it means we'd be taken less seriously in Washington, Beijing, Tokyo," he said.

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Tuesday 7 May 2013.