The Trades Union Congress have taken a step towards campaigning for a vote on the final Brexit deal despite claims from one union that such a move could prompt riots.

Delegates at the conference in Manchester on Monday voted to keep open the option of a public vote on the final Brexit deal and all unions backed calls for an early general election.

Union leaders made it clear they were not calling for a second referendum, but a say on any deal that would affect pay and employment rights.

It followed a debate in which a number of union leaders put forward different views on Brexit and how to respond to the current stalemate between the UK government and Brussels.

Monday’s debate will be closely watched by Jeremy Corbyn’s allies as they prepare for Labour’s conference in two weeks when Brexit will be a key topic.

Mick Cash, the head of the RMT union, which supported leaving the EU, said that a second referendum could lead to riots. “Let’s be honest here: the people’s vote or popular vote is nothing more than a Trojan horse to a second EU referendum, a second referendum that will lead to social unrest.

“Congress, if I went back to my members with a deal they had already rejected I would get unrest as well,” he told delegates. “We should be calling for one thing and one thing only: an urgent general election that returns a socialist Labour government led by Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell

“We don’t need a people’s vote, we need a national vote that will sweep this rotten Tory government out of power.”

In contrast, Manuel Cortes, leader of the Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association, said there must be an opportunity for people to respond to a deal because leaving the EU was too important to leave to politicians. “People voted to leave. It should be the people who decide what exit means,” he said.

The motion was proposed by Steve Turner, assistant general secretary of Unite. He called on trade unions to “rise like lions to challenge the threat of a hard-right Tory attack on working people and bosses who seek to use Brexit to shed jobs, offshore jobs and put a match to hard-won terms and conditions, protections and rights”.

He said workers wanted to secure their jobs and protect skills and investment alongside their employment rights and that families needed hope and opportunity to replace the “helplessness, fear and despair caused by mindless austerity”.

Delegates voted in favour of a TUC general council statement that said: “Congress calls on the general council to mobilise our movement politically and industrially to prevent either a cliff-edge Brexit or if the government’s withdrawal deal fails to meet the TUC’s tests.”

The TUC’s tests are for the final Brexit deal to protect workers’ rights, ensuring they don’t fall behind those of EU workers, and for the UK to maintain tariff-free and frictionless trade with the EU.