
Labour’s change on Brexit: Partisan, and possibly effective
The Labour Party is now the ‘Party of Soft Brexit’, declared the Observer front page as it reported on Labour Shadow Brexit Secretary Kier Starmer’s announcement that Labour will seek a four year transitional arrangement involving full UK membership of the EU Single Market and Customs Union.
Kier Starmer obviously hopes this will bring greater unity to Labour’s Brexit position. The 50 or so Labour MPs that voted for Chuka Umuna’s amendment to the Queen’s Speech in June have managed to change Labour policy in time for the end of the summer recess, moving away from its manifesto promise to leave the single market and customs union in order to control migration from the European Union. This will possibly anger some other Labour MPs — the group around Caroline Flint and others — even more. It’s not the greater unity, though, that is the key driver behind this – it’s Labour realising where its new electoral base lies.
Labour’s vote share may have increased by almost 10% points in the last General Election, but it wasn’t among their traditional base. It was Labour’s best General Election result among the middle classes in its history, and that delivered them heavily-Remain voting seats including Kensington and Canterbury. With the Tory vote share down in the polls and likely to split after a Brexit backlash, Labour is hoping these moves will be popular enough in traditionally Conservative seats like Putney to deliver them a majority. But what this policy doesn’t do is address the very real criticism of Labour’s Brexit strategy in that it is all over the place.
In the election, the Labour manifesto promised that Britain would withdraw from the single market and customs union — Jeremy Corbyn said so himself in the BBC Election Debate. A few weeks later, Shadow International Trade Secretary Barry Gardiner penned an article in The Guardian to explain why Labour policy was for Britain to leave both of those European institutions. Jeremy Corbyn even defended the focus on ending Freedom of Movement when he appeared on The Andrew Marr Show. Labour had a position, which some of its MPs disliked, but it was one that appeared to be at least somewhat in line with the Government’s own position.
Chancellor Philip Hammond raised the prospect of a transitional period, and arguments about trading with the United States and chicken-gate happened in a situation that made people generally just shake their heads. But the Government is now united on the prospect of a transitional deal running for a time-limited period, that would mean access to a customs union and a single market arrangement. It softened No.10's line that Freedom of Movement will end in 2019.
Labour’s position is broadly similar. A time-limited transitional arrangement will exist with the UK inside the Single Market and Customs Union, which goes one step further than the Government position. However, they’ve also promised to leave the option of remaining in the Single Market indefinitely on the table; contrary to the Government’s desire for a bespoke trade deal. But, they say, the indefinite retention of the single market would be based on that Freedom of Movement ending after the four year transition deal.
That’s not going to happen; the single market only functions when all four freedoms — goods, capital, services and people — are open to all member states, and the European Union is not willing to negotiate that; even the Conservatives understand this, and this has been the driving force behind the decision by Theresa May last January not to seek continued membership. Because of that decision, it’s likely that Labour’s position will be irrelevant by the time they come close to power.
It’s also worth noting that Philip Hammond, the Conservative Chancellor and Home Secretary Amber Rudd are both supportive of an extensive transition period, meaning Labour’s position offers little new ideas. Indeed, the biggest effect this will have is that the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill will have little opposition support, except from those Labour MPs like Caroline Flint that seek to represent their Leave-voting constituents and have made their view that “Single Market membership is EU membership in all but name”.
If Labour withdraw their Luke-warm support for the Withdrawal Bill without concessions on devolution and other aspects of the Bill’s more controversial parts, the Government could find itself in trouble with MPs like Anna Soubry willing to rebel in order to get a softer approach. With the parliamentary arithmetic as it is, certain amendments could be rather closely thought indeed. This would not only leave May’s premiership and Brexit timetable on a dangerously weak foot, but lead the Government into forced concessions on their Brexit plan. This could be particularly effective is, as expected, negotiations do not move onto phase two in October.
Of course, this is presuming that Jeremy Corbyn doesn’t change his mind again come the return of parliament…
