Given the pressure that the Whips are putting on the Tory backbenches is likely to increase, Guido thought he would prepare a handy guide to one-liners to throw back at them. Have a delve into Guido’s “Little Black Book of Whippicisms”…

Last time a government was on the ropes and refusing to grant a free vote, Mark Francois said “The government really don’t deserve to get away with this…”, in 2008 as the Tories’ shadow European minister, he mocked the LibDems for abstaining:  “They are going to hide in the toilets because they have not got the guts to vote.” He also accused Labour and the LibDems of not having “equal trust in the British people” in terms of letting them decide. He can add Conservatives to that list now…

Greg Hands, the latest addition to the Whips Office, has made his views on a referendum very clear in the past: “This is about democracy. The way the Government is trying to wriggle out of their promise to hold a vote is exactly the sort of behaviour that has eroded trust in politics.” Quite…

Chief Whip Patrick McLoughlin has unsurprisingly not publicly commented on the notion of a referendum or perhaps anything, on the record, ever. The same can’t be said of the rest of the gang though: Angela Watkinson MP voted for a referendum last time round, as did her fellow whips John Randall, Jeremy Wright, Brooks Newmark and James Duddridge. No doubt they will be reminded of that fact as they work the phones this weekend…