PM cannot let Eurosceptic ministers campaign for an Out vote,.

political correspondent,London(wp/es): David Cameron was today warned he will be “a laughing stock” if he allows Eurosceptic Cabinet ministers to campaign for an Out vote in the European Union referendum. Former deputy prime minister Lord Heseltine said there would be “civil war” in the Conservative party if Mr Cameron failed to impose collective responsibility on ministers. He spoke out as MPs ganged up on the Prime Minister to allow Eurosceptic ministers such as Iain Duncan Smith to speak out against EU membership when the referendum battle is staged. “I think that would be to make the Prime Minister a laughing stock across the world,” Lord Heseltine said. “To have a civil war within the Conservative party at that time in the belief that ... the participants in the civil war are going to sit round the table and happily smile together I think is rather naive.” He said ministers who disagreed should resign from the Cabinet. And he warned that Mr Cameron’s own position would be made “very difficult” if he allowed the “bitterness that would flow” from an open debate. Mr Cameron has postponed a decision on collective responsibility until closer to the campaign, but that has encouraged Right-wingers to argue in public. Former environment secretary Owen Paterson, a close ally of Mr Duncan Smith, said it would be “incredible” to expect big-hitters to toe the line. He derided Mr Cameron’s negotiation demands as “incredibly thin”, telling the Today programme: “It will be wholly incredible for some figures in the Cabinet to campaign for that.” Graham Brady, the influential chairman of the Conservative backbench 1922 Committee, said: “I don’t think anybody could possibly believe it if they were all corralled into holding a line they clearly didn’t all believe in.” The pressure on Mr Cameron grew after his key demand for a four-year curb on benefits paid to EU workers was torn apart at a summit in Brussels. Mr Cameron then signalled the In-Out referendum will be staged in 2016 anyway, prompting critics to suspect him of trying to steamroller a vote to stay. No 10 today said the Government will publish “factual” information about Britain’s EU membership before the vote, as required by the EU Referendum Act. But it denied a report that officials are already preparing a pamphlet to be sent to British households spelling out benefits of membership