Corbyn ready to back second vote on Brexit

BUT LABOUR PARTY CHIEF SAYS HE PREFERS A NEW ELECTION

British opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn said yesterday he would back a second Brexit referendum if his Labour Party votes to pursue the move, heaping pressure on Prime Minister Theresa May whose plans for a divorce deal with the EU have hit an impasse.

Corbyn, a veteran eurosceptic, has resisted growing demands to back a new “People’s Vote” on the decision to quit the European Union, keen to keep those party members on board who voted in favour of Brexit at a 2016 referendum.

But the political landscape has changed since May’s plans for Brexit — the biggest shift in British policy for more than four decades — were resoundingly rebuffed by the EU on Thursday, with any outcome of the negotiations more uncertain than ever.

With talk of a new election swirling after May’s “Chequers” plan was all but shredded at an EU summit last week and chances of a disorderly departure that could damage the economy rising, the opposition party is under pressure to set the Brexit agenda.

At Labour’s annual conference in the northern city of Liverpool, Corbyn, who in 1975 voted “No” to Britain’s membership of the then-European Community, said he would act on the result of a debate in Labour on a second Brexit vote. But he was clear that he preferred a new election.

Reuters ■ Anti-Brexit campaigners demonstrate outside the conference centre in Liverpool where the Labour Party began its annual meeting yesterday.