Corbyn shifts on Brexit as he pledges ‘unimpeded’ access to single market

JEREMY Corbyn has signalled a major shift in the UK Labour Party’s Brexit policy as he said he would guarantee the UK “unimpeded” access to the European single market.

Mr Corbyn used his keynote speech at the party’s annual conference in Brighton to claim that Labour was “now the political mainstream” as he urged Theresa May to call another general election.

He admitted that Labour had fallen short of victory on June 8 but stressed that the party was “on the threshold of power” and its election campaign machine remained “primed and ready to roll”.

The Labour leader launched a savage attack on Mrs May’s negotiations with Brussels as he accused the Tories of “self-interested Brexit bungling” and set out his own pitch to be prime minister.

Mr Corbyn also used his 75-minute long speech to criticise Donald Trump’s “disturbing” UN speech on North Korea.

He also linked the Tories’ “brutal” economic approach to the “chilling wreckage” of Grenfell Tower.

Mr Corbyn promised to impose gender pay audits on larger companies, with fines for those which fail to meet equality requirements.

Mr Corbyn was given a rapturous reception by a packed conference hall when he took to the stage and the pauses throughout his speech were filled with sustained applause and standing ovations from activists.

The address lacked the raft of new policy announcements traditionally associated with a conference speech by a party leader, coming as it did so soon after the last election.

But his intervention on Brexit marked a significant development in Labour’s withdrawal policy as he said the party would not give a “green light” to Tory “recklessness” on the issue.

“Conference, the real divide over Brexit could not be clearer,” he said.

“A shambolic Tory Brexit driving down standards or a Labour Brexit that puts jobs first, a Brexit for the many, one that guarantees unimpeded access to the single market and establishes a new co-operative relationship with the EU.”

It was not immediately clear how Mr Corbyn would deliver on such an unequivocal guarantee.

Divided

Denouncing government “bungling” of Brexit negotiations, Mr Corbyn claimed Mrs May and her ministers were “hanging on by their fingertips”, and mocked the prime minister’s “strong and stable” election slogan.

“This is a deeply divided government with no purpose beyond clinging to power,” he said.

“It’s Labour that’s now setting the agenda.”

Mr Corbyn claimed that the “real centre of gravity of British politics” had shifted and Labour was “now the political mainstream”.

He admitted that the party “didn’t do quite well enough” at the last general election but that Labour’s message to voters “could not be clearer”.

“We have become a government-in-waiting,” he said.

Labour is closing the gap in opinion polls to stand roughly level with the Conservatives, putting it within sight of winning an election.

The Conservatives have said they have no plans to call a vote anytime before 2022. (© Daily Telegraph, London)