The FTSE 100 share index has fallen below 6,000 for the first time since February as markets weigh up the possible outcome of next week's EU referendum.

The index of blue-chip companies was more than 1% lower in morning trading, continuing a trend of weakness ahead of the EU vote on 23 June. About £87bn has been wiped off the combined value of the shares in the past week. 

In other EU-related economic news, yields on German 10-year government bonds have turned negative for the first time.

The move is being seen as a sign of investors' nervousness about the slowing global economy and the potential for turbulence if the UK leaves the EU.  Read more

House of Commons
Parliament

The first question today is from Lib Dem Alistair Carmichael, who asks what steps the Ministry of Justice is taking to reduce the prison population. 

Justice Secretary Michael Gove says the priority is to reduce numbers "by making our prisons places of rehabilitation". 

The government announced a Prison and Courts Reform Bill in the Queen's Speech, which includes proposals for new "reform" prisons, with emphasis on training, rehabilitation and education.

Image source, PA

In March, former chief inspector of prisons Lord Ramsbotham warned government prison reforms will fail unless inmate numbers are reduced before they are put in place.

Justice Secretary Michael Gove has said he will not artificially "manage down" the prison population.

House of Commons
Parliament

The Commons meets at 11.30am for Justice questions, when topics will include the human rights of UK citizens in the event of the UK leaving the EU. 

That will be followed by an urgent question at 12.30 from shadow home secretary Andy Burnham on violence in Marseille involving England fans at the Euro 2016 tournament.

Image source, PA

Then MPs will move on to second reading of the Wales Bill, external - which sets out new powers to be transferred to the National Assembly for Wales or Welsh ministers.

It also changes the basis on which the Assembly operates by moving to a "reserved powers model" along the lines of the devolution settlement in Scotland. The aim is to provide a clearer separation of powers between what is devolved and what is reserved to Westminster, allowing the Assembly to legislate on any subject not specifically reserved to Parliament.

The day's adjournment debate is on provision for air passengers with dementia - led by the Conservative, Oliver Colvile.

A former Lib Dem leader calls on campaigners for Brexit to tone down their language on immigration for fear of permanently damaging race relations.

The Daily Politics

In the run-up to the EU referendum, the Daily Politics has offered a dozen key figures the chance to take to their soapboxes and make short films on the case for either remain or leave.  

On Tuesday's programme, the RMT union's Mick Cash puts the case for the UK to quit, while the TSSA union's Manuel Cortes explains why he thinks Britain should stay in.All previous films in this series can be seen here

House of Commons
Parliament

Here's a summary of what's going on in the Commons today: 

Image source, UK Parliament

Norman Smith
Assistant political editor

A lot of Labour folk gathering today take the view that the media are partly to blame for them struggling to get their message across because they say we're just not reporting what they're doing to push the Remain case.

But my understanding is that Jeremy Corbyn won't take any questions from the media after his event today. You're left scratching your head thinking, if you want us to report what you're saying, surely you have to let us ask you some questions.  

Image source, PA

The wife of former deputy prime minister Nick Clegg has given a scathing verdict on David Cameron's EU renegotiation efforts.

Miriam Gonzalez Durantez -  a partner at the law firm Dechert, whose husband supports Remain - told Fortune's annual Most Powerful Women event in London:

The Daily Telegraph

"A highly effective campaigner against British membership of the euro and for democratic reform of the European Union" - that's how the Daily Telegraph's obituary column remembers Lord Leach of Fairford,, external who has died at the age of 82.

It says the Conservative peer went against the grain when in 1998, "the prime minister Tony Blair was positioning the UK to join the euro with the full-hearted support of the CBI and many members of the business establishment".

But he was "self-effacing", it goes on, "when asked if he had personally saved Britain from a dangerous fate".

In 2005, Lord Leach founded Open Europe, a think tank which scrutinises EU policy, but he "was guarded in expressing his own preference" when it came to the current referendum campaign.

He had made "no public declaration" by the time he suffered a severe stroke in April this year, but an email sent to a friend in March, which was subsequently released, revealed he had written that "it has to be exit, painful though that may temporarily be".

Image source, Reuters

Minister and Leave Campaigner George Eustice says post-Brexit there would be even more money spent on things like structural funds, universities, or science, in place of existing EU grants.

"We will have more than enough to do it because we will stop £18 billion a year to the EU. We will have all of that money coming back, that will give us enough to fund what the EU currently does on our behalf, as well as give extra money as well."

Mr Eustice said that after 2020, the UK would put in place its "own national measures" and could "dramatically increase" spending on things like regional growth funds.

It's worth remembering, though, that fellow Leave minister Priti Patel said this morning her side were not making any "commitments" to continue this sort of EU funding, but instead were saying "the government of the day" could choose to do so because there would be "more than enough money" post-Brexit.

Theo Leggett
BBC Business News Reporter

Since 2004, child benefit and and child tax credit have only been paid to people from other European countries if they have a legal right to reside in Britain. This is restricted to those who are considered to be "economically active" and capable of supporting themselves. The European Commission challenged this principle in the European Court of Justice, claiming that because British citizens automatically had a right to reside, whether they were working or not, it amounted to discrimination against people from other Member States. 

Although the case was brought several years ago, the ruling comes at a time when the payment of benefits to EU migrants has become a key topic in the referendum campaign.  

Ministers campaigning to leave the European Union say recipients of EU funding will get the same money if the UK votes to leave - but Remain call it "fantasy economics".

Labour MPs campaigning for Brexit have urged the party's supporters to defy appeals by the leadership to back remaining in the EU.

In a joint letter to the Sun newspaper, they tell Labour voters they should not feel guilty about voting for Brexit.

Frank Field MP, who backs Leave, told the BBC that perhaps half of all Labour voters wish to withdraw, "and they should do so with confidence, but as Labour voters".

"We don't want them to go feeling there's something unclean in voting to withdraw and thinking of yourself as a Labour voter.

"Because if that happens then we've lost the next election, with another huge wave of Labour voters going over to UKIP because they feel we no longer represent their views."

- Ministers backing Leave say recipients of EU funding would get the same money if the UK votes to leave. But when pressed on the Today programme, one of them, Priti Patel, said Leave were not making "commitments" to protect funding, but "the government of the day" would have "more than enough money" if it to chose to do so after Brexit

- Labour will put on its biggest show of strength in the campaign so far today when Jeremy Corbyn and the entire shadow cabinet turn out to urge the party's supporters to back Remain

- Alan Johnson, leader of Labour Stronger In, insisted those worried about immigration should vote to stay in the EU. He said "the UK's border in Calais" would "not survive" Brexit, and inside the union, the UK would have more control on movement of people from future member countries like Turkey 

- the Sun has come out definitively in favour of a vote to Leave, external the EU, urging its readers to "free themselves" from "the undemocratic Brussels machine". It also attacked David Cameron directly for making "witless assurances" about the reforms he managed to secure from the EU 

- And speaking of the Brussels machine, a challenge to the UK's right to deny some EU migrants child benefit and child tax credits has been rejected by European judges. Benefit curbs were a key plank of David Cameron's EU renegotiations 

The Guardian

Media commentator Roy Greenslade takes a look at the Sun's Leave declaration, , externalnoting that the paper "likes nothing better than to oppose the establishment”.

He also insists the decision must have come from the very top - Rupert Murdoch himself.

"What difference will it make? Precious little. The overwhelming majority of the Sun’s readers who have decided to vote on 23 June have already made up their minds where to play their cross," Greenslade writes in the Guardian.

"But the Sun’s statement certainly has a symbolic importance and it is likely to give the jitters to the already nervous Cameron and his Remain campaigners."

Image source, Getty Images

A number of Labour figures - Hilary Benn, Alan Johnson and Gordon Brown among them - have said in recent days that illegal immigration is the biggest concern for British voters. But the former shadow chancellor Ed Balls suggests that's not the whole story, stressing that legal movement of people is an issue too.

"We need to press Europe to restore proper borders, and put new controls on economic migration," he writes in today's Daily Mirror.

"But if we leave the EU now, we can’t make those changes happen, and we’ll face the worst of all worlds - stay in the Single Market and be forced to accept free movement of people like Switzerland and Norway; or leave the Single Market and see jobs, investment and our public services hammered."