The Prime Minister wants to consider various options for a new relationship with Brussels
Nothing should be off the table in talks with the European Union, Angela Rayner said after Andy Burnham called for an “honest discussion” about a return to freedom of movement with the bloc.
The Prime Minister wants to consider various options for a new relationship with Brussels, potentially including a return to full EU membership or joining the single market – which would require free movement.
Mr Burnham will meet EU chiefs including European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen in Brussels on November 20 as he seeks to strike a better deal with the bloc. But he also wants a discussion about the long-term future of the UK-EU relationship, 10 years after the country voted for Brexit.
Housing Secretary Angela Rayner said: “The Prime Minister is clear that you can’t take anything off the table when you’re having a conversation.
“But the Prime Minister is not saying we’re going back to where we were in 2016. He’s saying we’ve got to be pragmatic to get the best deal for Britain and he wants to have the conversation.”
Mr Burnham has committed to the red lines set out in Labour’s 2024 manifesto, which ruled out a return to freedom of movement, the single market or customs union, meaning any change in relationship would have to wait until after an election.
Ms Rayner said: “I want to see the best deal for the people of my constituency and for Britain.
“We haven’t got the best deal at the moment because we’ve seen exports reduced by 20 per cent, we’ve seen the red tape and the friction that has meant that a lot of our businesses are not able to trade in the way that they would like with our biggest trading partners.
“So, I would like us to have an honest conversation about what the trade-offs could be and then put that to the people at a general election.”
Mr Burnham said he wanted to have a “very factual, quite evidence-based debate about this”. The issue of migration was one of the dominant factors during the 2016 Brexit referendum campaign.
But he suggested the type of migration experienced during the years of EU membership was different from the challenges faced now.
“It was generally younger people, not always, but spending a few years, then going back,” he said.
“And obviously the ease of that worked for British people as well.”
The Prime Minister acknowledged freedom of movement “had very significant challenges associated with it”.
“But at the same time, it was a type of immigration that perhaps wasn’t as difficult (as now).
“Revolving-door migration where people would come and then go back is different.”
But Mr Burnham said he could not imagine recommending joining the Schengen borderless area or ditching the pound to adopt the euro.
Tory leader Kemi Badenoch said: “This is yet another example of Burnham’s foot-in-mouth syndrome. He hasn’t thought this through or the implications.
“Most people who voted for Brexit did so because they didn’t want free movement. Too many politicians have failed to understand the significance and impact of immigration on communities.”
Reform UK also hit out at Mr Burnham, who said during the Makerfield by-election campaign which returned him to Westminster that he would not re-run the Brexit arguments.
Nigel Farage said the Prime Minister’s comments were “a total betrayal of Brexit Britain and Burnham’s Makerfield pitch”.
Reform’s Treasury spokesman Robert Jenrick said: “I think it’s completely mad, the idea that this country needs more immigration.”
But Liberal Democrat deputy leader Daisy Cooper said: “Freedom of movement, as well as freedom of capital and trade and ripping up red tape that has absolutely strangled British businesses, would be a really good thing for growth.”
Any fundamental change in the UK’s relationship with the EU would have to wait until after a general election due to the constraints imposed by Sir Keir Starmer’s 2024 manifesto.
Mr Burnham has previously insisted that he will not call an early election, with the next contest due in 2029.
But an Ipsos poll released on Sunday morning gave Labour an eight-point lead over the Conservatives, something which is likely to increase speculation that Mr Burnham could seek his own mandate from the country. The poll put Labour on 32 per cent, up five points on last month, the Conservatives up three points on 24 per cent and Reform UK down three points on 20 per cent. The Liberal Democrats were on 9 per cent, the Green Party on 8 per cent and others on 6 per cent.
Keiran Pedley, director of politics at Ipsos in the UK, said: “Whilst the headline figures do show a striking change, they confirm a pattern we have been seeing in the underlying data for some time.
“The Labour Party under Andy Burnham is resurgent, consolidating voters on the left behind them.
“On the right, the tectonic plates have been shifting recently and now this is reflected in the Conservatives – not Reform UK – being in a clear second place.
“However, we should be mindful against overreacting to one poll.
“The Government faces a challenging Budget this coming week and the lesson of the last year is the British politics is volatile. The picture today is very different to six months ago and it could be different again in six months time too.”
Ipsos interviewed a representative sample of 1,109 British adults online between October 15 and 22.