Calling a second referendum is disrespectful, says Labour chairman

THE campaign for a second referendum is “disrespectful” because voters already opted to leave the EU and now simply want the process to happen, Labour’s chairman has said.

Laying bare a split in Jeremy Corbyn’s top team, Ian Lavery attacked those calling for a so-called People’s Vote, stating: “There has already been a people’s vote. Who voted in the referendum? The people.”

His intervention comes amid a row brewing in the shadow cabinet on the position the party should adopt if Theresa May’s deal is voted down next week. Mr Corbyn, a lifelong Eurosceptic, has so far resisted calls for a public vote on Mrs May’s deal, which campaigners insist should include an option to remain in the EU.

But both Sir Keir Starmer, the shadow Brexit secretary, and Tom Watson, Mr Corbyn’s deputy, have talked up the possibility of another referendum amid stark divisions in the Commons over future arrangements with Brussels, and pressure from pro-Remain MPs for the exit process to be halted altogether. Last year Mr Watson said that if Labour members “call for a people’s vote on the deal, then we have to respect it”.

But Mr Lavery, who is in charge of preparing Labour for a general election, told a local newspaper: “I have been sticking by the fact that I was elected on a manifesto pledge to respect the result of a referendum in which 17.4m people voted [Leave].”

Responding to a survey which found that more than half of his constituents in Wansbeck, Northumber- land, would support a second referendum, Mr Lavery added: “The result in Wansbeck was heavily in support of Leave. I was a Remainer, and I respect the result of the referendum. To suggest that people want a People’s Vote is a little disrespectful.”

The MP told The Chronicle in Newcastle: “I do understand both sides of the argument. We need to continue to try to bring people together, because this is and continues to be a very divisive issue. I have listened to lots of people in my constituency as I always do, and that split remains.

“My view is that people are fed up with Brexit but most are clear that we should be leaving. I’ll continue to listen to what everybody has to say.”

His comments follow reports that he and Richard Burgon, the shadow justice secretary, had privately spoken out against a second vote in a meeting of the shadow cabinet last month. He becomes its second member publicly to oppose such a move in recent months, after Angela Rayner, the shadow education secretary, said that advocating such a position undermined democracy.

Sir Keir is said to be pushing Mr Corbyn to back the campaign for a second referendum if he fails to trigger a general election by winning a vote of no confidence in the Government if Mrs May’s deal is blocked. Labour MPs and grassroots are deeply split over a second referendum. Last week a YouGov poll found that seven in 10 Labour members favour a fresh referendum.

At the party’s annual conference in September, delegates passed a motion agreeing that if Mr Corbyn failed to secure a general election, the option of campaigning for another vote should remain “on the table”. The party could also push to extend Article 50 or back an alternative plan, such as one modelled on the relationship between Norway and Brussels, which is looser than EU membership. THE political adviser who masterminded the official Leave campaign would be a better post-Brexit prime minister than many of the ministers vying to succeed Theresa May, a former Eurosceptic MP has claimed.

Douglas Carswell, who, along with Dominic Cummings, is portrayed in a new film focused on Vote Leave, said that the campaign’s former director remained one of few people who have “the gumption and strategic sense” to successfully take on the political establishment.

Mr Cummings, a former adviser to Michael Gove, is played by Benedict Cumberbatch as a maverick who effectively went into battle with his own side as well as the Remain campaign backed by David Cameron’s team. Mat-