JOSE MANUEL BARROSO’s attempt to bully the British people into staying in the anti-democratic EU will convince no-one.

The unelected outgoing European Commission president hints that global companies will scarper in the event of a British exit, with negative consequences for jobs and manufacturing.

Such talk – without specific companies being named – is a touch reminiscent of the wails of overpaid bankers that they will relocate abroad if we take action over their fat-cat bonuses.

But the idea that the European Union has been good for manufacturing or jobs in the first place is laughable.

Britain has lost almost all its manufacturing capacity since the 1980s, as the Thatcher government and its successors destroyed industry to break the power of organised labour and bent the economy to the service of a swollen financial sector.

EU directives demanding the privatisation of state-owned assets have stripped elected governments of the right to plan and direct their economies, while the privateers themselves have cut jobs in order to boost profits.

The Stability and Growth Pact of 1992 placed severe restrictions on government borrowing, removing states’ power to invest in economies at times of recession.

This was a deliberate attempt to make markets “self-correcting” in the EU jargon – at times of recession unemployment would go up, allowing employers to force wages down.

Lower wages would provide an incentive for businesses to invest, according to the theory. So unemployment is in fact part of the EU’s preferred economic model – which is why neither the Commission nor the Central Bank have done anything to prevent soaring joblessness in the Eurozone since the 2008 crash.

The Stability, Governance and Growth Treaty of 2012 went further, cutting borrowing caps to 0.5 per cent of annual output in a bid to enshrine permanent austerity in Europe.

The free movement of capital, one of the key pillars of the entire EU project, has been instrumental in allowing companies to outsource work to countries where wages are lower – again with terrible consequences for British jobs.

Of course, Barroso is right that big business is keen on the EU and would be furious at a British withdrawal.

The European Union exists to promote the power of corporations at the expense of elected national governments – as is made clear by the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership currently being negotiated with the United States, with its clauses allowing firms to sue governments whose legislation reduces their profits.

So unfortunately the EU chief may be right that our exit could lead to hostile action by corporations.

But Britain’s working people cannot be held to ransom in this way.

No-one who knows the heroic story of Cuba’s revolution and its half-century battle against an illegal US embargo would be surprised at big business attempts to sabotage any country seeking economic self-determination.

It’s a risk we have to take – because the alternative, staying in the EU, is so much worse.

With every passing year the unelected European Commission and Central Bank’s power over the governments of Europe grows.

Their agenda of endless privatisation, “flexibility” in the form of poorer working conditions, lower wages and mass unemployment offers nothing for the working class.

It’s now coupled with an increasingly aggressive foreign policy stance, as shown in the destabilisation of Ukraine and that country’s descent into civil war – a war which runs the nightmarish risk of spilling over into direct conflict with Russia.

Britain needs an alternative – peace and socialism. The European Union offers us neither.