Sir Keir Starmer last night dropped another huge hint he wants to unravel Brexit as he hit out at ‘wild promises’ made about the UK’s departure from the EU.
The Prime Minister used his annual Guildhall speech on foreign policy to claim Britain was still ‘dealing with the consequences’ of severing ties with Brussels.
In an attack on the Tories and Reform UK, he said Brexiteers were now making the ‘same spurious argument’ to quit the European Convention on Human Rights.
Sir Keir took a further swipe as he added it would be ‘utterly reckless’ to use Brexit as ‘a template for our future foreign policy’.
Earlier this year, the PM agreed a Brexit ‘reset’ with European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen as he negotiated closer trade ties with Brussels.
But he has since hinted he could go further in moving the UK back towards the EU, with the PM having frequently attacked the ‘significant’ economic damage of Brexit.
It was recently reported that Sir Keir’s chief economic adviser, Minouche Shafik, pitched rejoining the EU’s customs union to get the UK’s economy growing.
The Observer said the suggestion, made soon after she took on the Downing Street role in September, was swiftly rejected.
The Prime Minister used his annual Guildhall speech on foreign policy to claim Britain was still ‘dealing with the consequences’ of severing ties with Brussels.
Earlier this year, the PM agreed a Brexit ‘reset’ with European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen as he negotiated closer trade ties with Brussels.
In his speech at the Lady Mayor’s Banquet in central London on Monday night, Sir Keir said Brexit ‘broke’ a ‘broad’ consensus about Britain’s role in the world.
‘We were of one mind that Britain should be outward-looking, engaged and active on the world stage. A powerful voice at the top table,’ the PM said.
‘That was taken as a given. Part of who we are, in line with the greatest traditions of this country, as British as fish and chips or the Guildhall itself. But then Brexit broke that consensus.
‘I want to speak very frankly. The Brexit vote was a fair, democratic expression and I will always respect that. But how it was sold and delivered was wrong.
‘Wild promises were made to the British people and not fulfilled. We are still dealing with the consequences today in our economy, and in trust – in the degradation of political debate.
‘Now I raise this not to rake up the past, but to learn from it. And to use it to inform what comes next.
‘The idea that leaving the EU was the answer to all our cares and concerns has clearly been proved wrong.
‘But that same spurious argument is now being made about the European Convention on Human Rights.
‘With the same wild promises being made to the country by the same people: Walk away, and all our problems will be solved.
‘To consider Brexit a template for our future foreign policy is utterly reckless.’
Elsewhere in his Guildhall speech, the PM defended his Government’s thaw in relations with China.
Sir Keir rejected a ‘binary choice’ between the ‘golden age’ of engagement with Beijing under David Cameron and the ‘ice age’ under more recent Tory PMs.
Arguing that failing to engage with China was ‘a dereliction of duty’, he said: ‘This is not a question of balancing economic and security considerations.
‘We don’t trade off security in one area, for a bit more economic access somewhere else.
‘Protecting our security is non-negotiable – our first duty. But by taking tough steps to keep us secure, we enable ourselves to co-operate in other areas.’
Earlier on Monday, the PM had used another speech – in which he defended Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ Budget – to claim the Brexit deal had ‘significantly hurt our economy’.
Sir Keir argued closer alignment with the EU was now needed, which will involve concessions to Brussels.
‘We must all now confront the reality that the Brexit deal we have significantly hurt our economy and so for economic renewal, we have to keep reducing frictions,’ he said.
‘We have to keep moving towards a closer relationship with the EU, and we have to be grown up about that, to accept that this will require trade-offs.’
Reform’s deputy leader Richard Tice said: ‘The UK voted to escape the EU bureaucracy and their burdensome regulations. We should be diverging, not aligning.’
