LABOUR’S BREXIT CHAOS
Shambles as party faithful are told 2nd poll could keep us in EU
LABOUR was at war over Brexit yesterday after frontbencher Sir Keir Starmer declared the party could keep Britain in the European Union.
The shadow Brexit secretary received a standing ovation at the party’s conference in Liverpool after he insisted a second referendum could include the option of staying in the EU.
But he was immediately slapped down by Labour’s union backers – and Brexit supporters warned it would be ‘a betrayal of the very highest order’.
Amid the mounting confusion, shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry last night suggested that the party would delay Brexit so the country did not leave the EU in March next year as planned. Jeremy Corbyn has repeatedly pledged that Labour accepts the referendum result – including in his manifesto ahead of last year’s election.
But the Labour leader last night backed his shadow Brexit secretary after he said the party could offer a vote to cancel leaving the EU.
In his keynote speech at the conference yesterday, Sir Keir said that if Labour could not secure a general election, ‘we must have other options’.
‘That must include campaigning for a public vote,’ he said.
‘It is right that Parliament has the first say but, if we need to break the impasse, our options must include campaigning for a public vote and nobody is ruling out Remain as an option.’
Many delegates got to their feet to applaud the remarks, and in a vote last night the party conference voted overwhelmingly to keep the option of a fresh vote on Brexit ‘on the table’. But one of the country’s biggest trade unions condemned Sir Keir’s remarks.
Unite assistant general secretary Steve Turner said that ‘despite what Keir said earlier’, a second vote should be ‘on the terms of our departure’, without an option on the ballot paper to remain part of the EU.
His comments echoed those made by shadow chancellor John McDonnell on Monday, when he dismissed the idea of a second in-or-out vote.
Labour MP gareth Snell, whose Stoke-on-Trent Central constituency strongly backed Leave, said Sir Keir’s ‘unilateral declaration’ about the possibility of a Remain option was ‘disappointing’. He added: ‘While members rejoice, we must not forget the voters we need to win over.’
Brendan Chilton, of pro-Brexit group Labour Leave, said: ‘This is a betrayal of the very highest order. It is a betrayal not only of the millions of Labour voters, but of our 2017 manifesto.
‘Keir does not respect the democratic process and, even worse, he does not respect our voters. It is a betrayal that voters will remember for a very long time, and we will lose MPs as a result.
At a fringe event, Sir Keir said he did not know whether the day of Brexit would be delayed if the government’s proposals were voted down in Parliament or if an election put Labour into power. ‘I don’t know whether Article 50 will have to be extended or not,’ he said. ‘I do know we are running out of time.’
But Miss Thornberry told an event hosted by The Times that if Labour took office in a snap election, ‘we need to extend Article 50 and essentially turn up in Europe and say, “the grown-ups have turned up now”.’
In a round of TV interviews last night, Mr Corbyn repeatedly refused to say if he would vote Remain in any new referendum. He told the BBC: ‘We don’t know what the question is going to be in the referendum so that is a hypothetical question. I can’t answer that question because we don’t know what the question is going to be.’
Speaking to reporters as she flew to New York for the United Nations general Assembly yesterday, Theresa May attacked Labour’s Brexit policy.
‘What I do know is that we have a Labour Party whose position in this is clear,’ she said.
‘Labour will oppose any deal I bring back regardless how good it is for the UK.
‘They will accept any deal the EU gives regardless of how bad it is for the UK. That is not in the national interest, what we are doing is in the national interest.’
SHADOW Brexit Secretary Sir Keir Starmer in 2017: ‘There’s no dispute that Britain will leave the European Union in March 2019… As our election manifesto made clear, Labour accepts and respects the referendum result.’ Yet yesterday he declared: ‘Nobody is ruling out Remain as an option.’
And he said he would back a second public vote to ‘break the impasse’ in the Brexit talks. Labour is determined to create just such an impasse, with its threat to vote against any deal the Government may agree with the EU.
Labour is hell-bent on sabotage to serve its own ends but who in their right minds, watching their celebration of Marxism and enemies of Israel, would think Jeremy Corbyn and his divided party competent to run anything?