And it has succeeded. Not only in turning old enemies France and Germany into close allies, but also in spreading democracy, human rights and the rule of law into countries which were dictatorships until the 1970s (including Spain, Portugal and Greece), or under Soviet control until the end of the Cold War in the 1990s.

These are astonishing achievements.

Bringing peace and prosperity to a continent which had been ravaged by war for a thousand years previously. Successfully nurturing democracy in potentially highly unstable countries in our own backyard. Extending human rights and the rule of law to hundreds of millions of European people through diplomatic means.

The EU was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize in 2012 for precisely these achievements.

So it makes me sad that Britain is now poised to abandon this great project.

But at least I’m in good company. For since this referendum was announced, seemingly every leader of the free world has urged us to remain. US President Barack Obama. German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. And many, many more. In fact the only major overseas voices calling for Brexit seem to be US Presidential candidate Donald Trump and French National Front leader Marine Le Pen.

Meanwhile a consensus has emerged among British politicians and experts in favour of staying in the EU. Every current and former British Prime Minister. Every major UK political party leader except Nigel Farage. 300 leading historians. 83% of scientists. 40 religious leaders. Our six largest trades unions. 88% of economists. The Chief Executive of NHS England. The Royal College of Midwives. The National Farmers Union. An overwhelming majority of British businesses of all sizes.

The leave campaign glibly dismiss their concerns as ‘Project Fear’ – as if fear of Brexit was some kind of irrational phobia like being scared of spiders.

But there are clear and present dangers from leaving the EU – not least of course destabilising the institution that has brought peace to our continent for the first time in a thousand years.

Economists warn that Brexit will trigger a recession. People rightly take economists’ predictions with a pinch of salt. But you don’t need a complicated econometric model to tell you that investors don’t like risk. And you don’t need a crystal ball to see that risk and uncertainty will abound in the event of Brexit. For nobody – on either side of the debate – can tell you what our terms of trade would be with our largest trading partners afterwards. What kind of trade deals we might make to replace those which we would lose. What exit terms the other 27 EU countries would demand if we left. Or even whether we would remain in the Single Market or not. As a small business owner who trades with both EU and non-EU countries, let me tell you: these are not minor details.

And let me address one of the most pernicious myths of this campaign. That remaining in Europe is good for the elite, whilst leaving is good for the ‘man in the street’. Rubbish. The elite will be fine either way. They’ll find something else to do, or somewhere else to go, if the worst comes to the worst. But the man in the street? He’s the one who’ll be made redundant if a recession hits. He’s the one who will find his budget stretched beyond breaking point if our currency depreciates and imports become more expensive. For the dismal truth is: when economic trouble strikes, it’s those who can least afford it that suffer the most.

One thing we can say for sure is that whatever happens in the EU referendum, the next British General Election isn’t scheduled until 2020. We probably will have a new prime minister before then though as Cameron has indicated he’ll step down during this Parliament. Sooner rather than later I expect if he loses the referendum. So if we do leave the EU, the renegotiation of our employment rights and environmental safeguards currently handled by the EU will fall to the triumphant Eurosceptic right-wing of the Tory party. Is that what you want? Possibly, if you’re one of the eccentric billionaires or offshore media moguls who is behind the leave campaign. But I fear for ordinary voters (including moderate Conservatives like me) that would be a very worrying dynamic.

Some say that it is not the EU but NATO which secures our peace. They are half right. NATO is our most powerful military alliance. But as we have learned time and again, you cannot bomb another country into becoming a peaceful democracy. And whether you care about their citizens or not, it matters to Britain whether our neighbours are democracies or despotisms. Nothing has been more effective in spreading democracy and the rule of law in our neighbourhood over the last 40 years than the European Union. Yet oddly it’s those same people who say that being an EU member involves an intolerable loss of sovereignty. Giving up powers which should reside at home. I say oddly as they almost never complain about our NATO membership, which does exactly the same thing – sharing our sovereign power with other nations to achieve a greater outcome than we could achieve on our own. To the EU, we must pay a membership fee, accept free movement of people and the supremacy of EU law. Not insignificant contributions. But less significant than having to declare war if somebody attacks a NATO ally. And Britain is of course free to leave the EU whenever she likes through a simple majority vote in Parliament and the exercise of Article 50.

And this is my final observation: this referendum is asymmetric. If we leave, and then decide we made the wrong choice, rejoining would require the consent of all 27 other member states. But if we remain, and then decide later that we wish to leave, Britain can do that on her own through a simple Act of Parliament. So if there’s any doubt at all in our minds, then clearly it is better to remain and keep our options open than to leave and be at the mercy of 27 other countries should we later realise our error.