Keir Starmer rejects Labour calls to pledge Norway-style Brexit

Emilio Casalicchio

Shadow Brexit Secretary Keir Starmer today slapped down dozens of Labour peers who defied Jeremy Corbyn and voted for a Norway-style Brexit.



The top Labour MP said staying in the European Economic Area was “not the answer” for the UK after it leaves the EU, just a day after former party leader Neil Kinnock called for a rethink.

It marks the strongest rejection yet from a Shadow Cabinet member of EEA membership, which would effectively keep Britain in the European single market.

Some 83 Labour peers this week rebelled against Mr Corbyn to support an amendment to the Government's flagship EU Withdrawal Bill which called for the UK to join Norway in the EEA.

Lord Kinnock yesterday urged Labour MPs to defy the leadership and back EEA membership when the amendment comes back before the Commons.

But Mr Starmer refused the calls during an appearance on the BBC Andrew Marr show this morning.

He explained that he had concluded, during a visit to Norway, that the EEA would be insufficient in keeping the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland open.

“It has infrastructure on the border with Sweden - so that’s not the answer,” Mr Starmer told the BBC Andrew Marr show.

“But to the challenge - does the agreement need to hardwire in the benefits of the single market - the answer from Labour is very clear: Yes it does.”

Lord Kinnock - who was among the Labour peers who voted for the amendment - said opposition to the EEA was based on “infantile leftist illusion”.

In an article for the Independent, he wrote: “It would be a serious evasion of duty if Labour did not seize this chance to protect our country from the rockslide of ‘hard’ Brexit...

“Not continuing in the EEA would mean endangering, sacrificing, thousands of skilled and decently paid jobs and, with them, the life chances of countless families and communities.”

Speaking in Scotland on Friday, Mr Corbyn said the EEA would “not offer us any power to negotiate” aspects of tariff-free trade with the EU after Brexit.

He added: “We would merely be rule-takers not rule-makers in that.

"So, we would want a comprehensive relationship with the EU that developed that trading relationship."

Elsewhere, Labour's sister party in Northern Ireland, the SDLP, has called on its MPs to defy Mr Corbyn and vote for the UK to stay in the single market.