EVERY four years there is speculation about how long the England football team will stay in Europe. But this year, there is a new dimension to the discussion.

When Roy Hodgson’s men inevitably crash out of the European championships in the quarter finals, they could be returning to a country that has itself left Europe’s top table.

The date for our referendum on EU membership has been set for June 23, and I am glad that the prime minister has come out firmly for staying in now he has got his reform deal. I have been dismayed by lot of what David Cameron’s government has done, but I respect the fact that on Europe at least he is putting the national interest first and ignoring the siren voices inside his own party.

I will also be voting to stay in, not because I have a lot of affection for the EU but because I care about this country too much to risk our long-term prosperity by walking away.

This is the biggest decision people in Britain will face for a generation, affecting ourselves and our children and grandchildren for decades to come.

I know that a lot of people are frustrated by the EU and will be tempted to vote to leave. I understand the feeling, but while it is easy to list complaints (which often turn out to be myths), it is much more difficult to make a serious case that we would be better off out.

Those campaigning to leave may have persuaded Boris Johnson that he is more likely to be prime minister if he joins them, but I think the British people are too pragmatic to be swayed.

It is unrealistic to think that we could get better trade deals, more influence and better security if we left. Promises of greater control would run out to be the opposite; in reality we will just be locked out of the room while the rest of Europe makes the big decisions.

England fans know that our performances in Europe can be frustrating. But they also know that watching from the sidelines when we go out is worse.

While the European question is rightly front and centre at the moment, the government should not let it distract them from the business of running the country. On their watch, the number of children living in poverty across the UK has risen dramatically and further planned cuts to support for vulnerable families mean that this trend is only set to rise.

Many Furness families are struggling already, with one in four children growing up in poverty, but this week the government are bringing forward more cuts that will affect 9,900 children in Furness and risk driving even more into hardship.

The government has what Baldrick from Blackadder would call a “cunning plan”. Ministers have decided to simply stop measuring child poverty in the hope that people will not notice the effect their policies are having on working families.

But the cost is there for all to see. In Barrow we have seen the opening of the first soup kitchen of modern times at St Matthew’s Church in Highfield Road.

The brilliant volunteers who are running the kitchen should make us all proud, but it should shame the government thatpeople are having to turn to food banks and soup kitchens to survive.

Instead of trying to pretend that child poverty doesn’t exist, the government should be taking real steps to boost family incomes so that no child in our country grows up poor.