Burnham lacks a plan for EU reset, Cabinet ministers fear

Ministers fear Andy Burnham has “no plan” to reset Britain’s relationship with the EU , The Telegraph can reveal. Several members of the Cabinet are concerned the Prime Minister’s “honest conversation” about his plans for a closer relationship with Brussels could backfire by reopening a “huge row” about Brexit and driving voters towards Reform UK . Mr Burnham said in September that he would lay out the “different options” for Britain’s “long-term relationship” with Europe around the time of the next UK-EU summit on Nov 20.

However, The Telegraph understands that he now intends only to set out the “principles” behind any future renegotiation and stop short of addressing specific proposals, including rejoining the EU or re-entering its customs union . Some ministers are frustrated that Mr Burnham’s approach has left Cabinet members without a clear policy to explain when they are asked about Brexit. One minister said they were “very concerned” about the issue, adding: “He’s opened up a debate without a plan.

It has just opened a lot of old wounds and reignited support for Reform that was waning.” Several ministers, including John Healey , Yvette Cooper and Lisa Nandy, represent constituencies which had a high proportion of Leave voters at the 2016 referendum, and could be at risk from a Brexiteer campaign at the next election. Mr Healey, the Chancellor, said last week that he did not expect the UK to rejoin the EU in his lifetime, despite Mr Burnham’s aspiration that it would.

One senior Government source said the Brexit debate had been causing concern for ministers, who were “going back and checking referendum results in their seats and thinking, ‘Where does this put me at the next election?’”. A second source said the Cabinet had been “caught by surprise” when Mr Burnham announced during the Labour Party conference in September that he would review membership of the EU . The source said: “Now we have opened up a huge row about it, but what is the policy?

It’s really unclear.” Mr Burnham has said he will keep to Sir Keir Starmer’s “red lines” on Brexit for the remainder of the current parliament, preventing him from rejoining the customs union or single market. However, he has said he would consider various options for the future, including full membership of the EU, a return to freedom of movement or more cooperation on specific issues. He has argued that Brexit has done “ more harm than good ” since the UK left the EU in 2020, and has talked up the economic benefits of aligning more closely with the bloc’s rules, while refusing to rule out a second referendum.

On Friday, Mr Burnham admitted that the latest agreement with Brussels on food standards would make Britain a “rule taker”, adding: “That’s where we’ve ended up, but it is about working in partnership where we can.” Labour MPs expected Mr Burnham to set out his preferred options later this month, but Whitehall sources said he would make a more “discursive and open ended” intervention with no “granular detail” and no description of his preferred outcome.

Those familiar with the plans say that setting out Britain’s hope for a new relationship with Brussels “wouldn’t be a great negotiating tactic” and would put the country on the “back foot”, and so Mr Burnham would set out “broad strokes” and “tradeoffs”. A Downing Street source insisted that the Prime Minister would fulfil his commitment to Labour members at the conference, where he promised to “lay out to the country what I believe the different options are”, and to “see if we can find consensus around one”.

The EU has not set out an official position on Britain rejoining because the Government has not yet formally applied to do so. European Commission officials have made it known that it would be possible to regain membership without signing up to the Schengen free-travel area or adopting the euro, which would make the idea more difficult to sell to voters. A YouGov poll in June found that 55 per cent of the public would support rejoining the EU, but only 35 per cent would want to do so if Britain lost its previous carve-outs from the euro and Schengen.