Thanks for everyone's replies.
My husband and I have quite high earnings per month (although certainly not $14,000 every month, but over half of that) and so we can demonstrate that we're already earning quite a lot (in the UK). The "gift" from his parents before we submit the official application will be legitimate and will stay in or savings account until we move to Canada if accepted, so it is not a loan and we will be able to prove it's still there 2 years down the line (when it looks likely we can actually move if accepted).
I've heard that some decisions are at the discretion of your officer, and feel that these two points teamed together - as long as we prove the gift is actually ours to keep - shouldn't really cause us a problem?
When you enter the EE pool, you won't know when you get invited, if at all, so it doesn't seem to make sense to me to have to definitely have the funds there ready when applying for the EE pool.
The problem here I think is that this is an entirely new system (which people here seem to forget!) and no one actually knows what the acceptance rate is or have heard any stories relating to acceptance etc from this year.