Tag: William Austin Starmer

Therefore we will be leaving the EU in March 2019.” So there it is. The man in charge of the Brexit policy of a pro-European opposition party that could soon be in government, that campaigned for Remain, and two-thirds of whose supporters backed staying in the European Union on referendum day, holds out no hope of reversing the decision. “Almost everybody in the Labour party has a view on Brexit. We have got to hold the party together, and of course that means there are huge challenges.” As if to make the point for him, on the day we speak his shadow cabinet colleague Owen Smith is sacked by Corbyn for saying Labour must back staying in the single market and a second referendum – both of which are against current party policy. He has already dragged Corbyn, the shadow chancellor John McDonnell, and the shadow trade secretary Barry Gardiner round to the view that Labour should back remaining in a customs union with the EU post-Brexit. Labour’s 2017 manifesto said merely that the party wanted to retain “the benefits of the single market and the customs union”, and did not say the UK should stay in either. There is also the incentive that Labour could defeat the government in the Commons by voting with Tory rebels on an amendment to back the customs union. But no sooner had he delivered on the customs union commitment a few weeks ago than Starmer faced a barrage of demands from the large pro-EU wing of the parliamentary Labour party to go a big step further and support keeping the UK in the single market, too. Plenty of pro-single market Labour MPs say Starmer could honour the referendum result (and take the UK out) while remaining in the single market by joining the European Free Trade Association, like Norway. “We need no persuading of the benefits of the single market and customs union.