Labour leader: I won’t take UK back into European Union

Labour leader: I won't take UK back into European Union

Labour leader: I won't take UK back into European Union. Image: Rupert Rivett/Shutterstock.com

Labour leader Keir Starmer has said he won’t lead the UK back into the European Union should he become Prime Minister.

In an interview the Labour leader gave to Sky News on Monday, July 4, Keir Starmer said that the European Union is a part of the UK’s past not its future.

“We’re not going back to the EU, to the single market, to the customs union or freedom of movement,” he said.

“We are going forwards not backwards, not reopening those divisions.

“I don’t think reopening all the old wounds and going backwards is going to help us on that mission to drive the economy.”

Starmer was speaking prior to announcing a five-point Brexit plan that he would implement if Labour were to win the next UK General Election. 

The Labour leader said that  his plan would “remove some of the barriers” to trading with the EU that are currently “holding us back.”

Starmer described the UK’s current Brexit agreement as “not a good deal,” adding that it was causing issues in Northern Ireland and that it wasn’t strong enough on security and services. 

“This is a forward-looking plan,” he said of his own proposal. “It’s not a plan to go back, it’s not a plan to rejoin the EU.”

The leader of the opposition in the UK said that he had no regrets over no campaigning for a second Brexit referendum, which was part of his party’s platform for the last General Election.

Labour were unsuccessful in their bid topple Prime Minister Boris Johnson as the Conservative party won with a 43.6 percent share of the vote on December 12, 2019 to hold an 80-seat majority.

“We made our policy in the circumstances that were then the live circumstances,” Starmer said. “But we’ve left the EU now and the government has said we need to get Brexit done, but it hasn’t really got a plan to do that.”

“I want to make Brexit work.”


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Written by

Tom Hurley

Comments


    • Andy

      05 July 2022 • 16:30

      In that case,, Keir Starmer has got his wish already. If he DOESN’T care to take the UK back in to the EU, that it never should have left in the first place and where the UK public were conned into brexit by Boris and his cronies for personal profiteering,, then he and his party will be unlikely to even WIN an overall election in the UK, come next term or, even earlier. They may have forgotten that 49% of that referendum voted stay and for good reason. 49% of the voters had the hindsight that it would harm the country in many ways. The proof is already out there and even many of the original brexiteers ( including parliament members ) have seen the error they made on that fateful journey to exit. I remember the day, directly before the vote was announced, our local currency exchange was happy to provide 1.35 Euros for every UK Pound that was put across the counter. The following day, they proffered no more that 1.09 Euros for that same Pound. Exchange rates do NOT alter overnight like that unless there is a major issue and this, surely WAS, a statement from the world, that you reap what you sow.. As over 40% of our produce intake was still being fed in from the EU, this sowing exercise saw a cost increase to both remainers and exiters, of over 20% in our supermarkets for those same goods, not 4 weeks later. Mr Starmer needs to be reminded of that when he makes such rash statements about predicting his own future and gets it into his head, that the original 51/49 % has since, gone the other way ( and probably by a greater margin, now that the same British public have far less in their pockets to feed their families, as cannot be argued against ) and that old majority have seen the error of their previous votes, then who IS going to vote for such a political policy? Tory’s are already in their swansong mode, Labour ( well, its leader anyway ) is carving a path to another obvious carpet of defeat. That leaves ( in theory ), the next upcoming minority. Liberal Democrats. The only relevant political wing that realised beforehand, UK should STAY!. Mr Starmer ( of supposedly, some intellect ), also seems to have forgotten the public response in recent times, when the vacancy of council seats became available due to Tory outages, it was the Liberal Democrats who were attaining the majority of votes. NOT Labour! If you cannot realise trends and how to attract voters, then party leadership is not for the short sided, hard of hearing candidate. On today’s balance ( as constantly shown in the polls ) over 60% of UK residents AND expats, now wish to revoke the last referendum and rejoin to relish their due prior privileges’ . It would be political suicide to think otherwise. UK voters are NOT stupid, just easily led by others. But when they have been abused by others, they don’t just bear their backsides to take another kicking. If Liberal Democrat party makes a statement AND a commitment to rejoin the EU before next term, then the colour Yellow, will become more than just a fashion statement.

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