Confusion over Labour position on EU single market after

CONFUSION surrounded Labour’s position on the EU single market, after Jeremy Corbyn appeared to suggest he was keeping the door open for continued UK membership after Brexit.

In a radio interview, the Labour leader said he wanted British companies to be able to “trade within the single market” after the transition period expected to follow EU withdrawal, and said it was “open for discussion” whether this goal would be achieved by formal membership or through a trade deal.

But shortly after his comments were made, a spokesman for the Labour leader insisted that the party’s position had not changed and that there was no question of the UK being a member of the single market once the transition period is complete.

Shadow Brexit secretary Sir Keir Starmer had previously said Labour was “flexible” about adopting a new single market relationship or a bespoke trade deal after transition, but Mr Corbyn’s comments appeared to go further and open up the possibility of a Norway-style arrangement in which the UK could be in the single market but not the European Union.

Mr Corbyn added to the confusion by saying that he believed formal membership of the market was possible only by remaining in the EU.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s World at One, he said: “We want a relationship which allows us to trade within the single market. Whether that’s formal membership – which is only possible, I believe, if you are actually a member of the EU – or whether it’s an agreed trading relationship, is open for discussion.”

But his spokesman later issued a clarification, saying: “We won’t be ‘members’ of the single market after the transition. We want to achieve full tariff-free access to the single market.

“That could be achieved by a new relationship with the single market or a bespoke trade deal with the EU.”

Mr Corbyn also said he wanted Britain to retain membership of “many” EU agencies following its withdrawal from the 28-nation bloc and would “forever” be part of the European Convention on Human Rights and subject to the European Court of Human Rights, which is not an EU body. The Labour leader ordered his MPs to vote against the Government’s EU (Withdrawal) Bill at second reading in the House of Commons last night. But he insisted he respects the result of the 2016 referendum to take Britain out of the EU.

“There was a referendum and I think we have to respect the result of