London Mayor Sadiq Khan (rear C) hugs Britain’s main opposition Labour Party leader Keir Starmer as he congratulates him following his speech during the launching of the Labour Party’s election manifesto in Manchester, on June 13, 2024.
OLI SCARFF / AFP
The prime minister is also being urged to take Britain back into the EU single market and customs union.
The prime minister is, of course, susceptible to such calls, given that he campaigned against Brexit in the 2016 referendum and later fought for the vote to be overturned. His deputy, David Lammy, also called Tory Brexiteers ‘Nazis’ and pushed for a second referendum.
Now, Labour London Mayor Sadiq Khan says the government should give up on the idea referendums and “fight the next general election with a clear manifesto commitment,”
A vote for Labour means we would rejoin the European Union.
Khan told Italian daily la Repubblica that this outcome is “inevitable” because of the “damage” Brexit—as opposed to, say, the useless establishment parties—has done. He added that even before the next election, which will be held no later than August 2029, Starmer should take Britain back into the EU single market and customs union, whether voters desire this or not.
“The destiny of the United Kingdom and of London,” he stressed, “lies in the European Union.”
Reform councillor Mason Humberstone said the mayor “lives in a bubble,” since “people don’t want to rejoin the EU. They want Brexit actually delivered.”
Don’t blame the vision. Blame the cowardice of those who failed to deliver it. Britain needs backbone, not this recycled establishment nonsense.
The demand has received some pushback from Labour, too, with one MP, Josh Newbury, responding: “Absolutely not.”
But the prime minister is perhaps more likely to listen to other, more Brexit-sceptical voices. One, businessman Simon Nixon, who was fairly supportive of Starmer ahead of his 2024 election, this week wrote that the idea “Brexit was a monumental act of national self-harm is now barely contested,” adding:
The debate over how to deepen cooperation has taken on a new urgency amid the splintering of the global order and a widening transatlantic rift.
Labour minister Sir Chris Bryant on Thursday refused to rule out a ‘rejoin EU’ pledge at the next election, stressing that “we should be immensely ambitious about our relationship” with Brussels.
Michael Curzon is a news writer for europeanconservative.com based in England’s Midlands. He is also Editor of Bournbrook Magazine, which he founded in 2019, and previously wrote for London’s Express Online. His Twitter handle is @MichaelCurzon_.
