A ‘People’s Brexit’ pledge

The shadow chancellor John McDonnell has unveiled plans for “a people’s Brexit” putting jobs and industry at the heart of the country’s future.

In a major speech at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers McDonnell accused Theresa May of presiding over a “chaotic Tory Brexit”, saying the government could not be trusted to a make a success of leaving the European Union.

This was a speech in which Labour’s long-term economic vision was set out, with plans to rebuild and transform Britain so that “no-one and no community is left behind.”

McDonnell accused the Tories of offering “a bankers’ Brexit at the expense of the rest of the overall economy” which would cut sweetheart deals for the City, while ignoring manufacturing.

The result of the referendum was, he said, “forcing a series of profound choices on our country.” Labour would, he added “always prioritise supporting jobs, growth and the public finances.”

He accused the government of looking after the few, not the majority, while Tory backbenchers were set to “attack hard-won workplace rights.”

McDonnell stressed his concerns about the future for small businesses and manufacturing but said that Labour was committed to fighting to have access to the Single Market for all and working constructively with European neighbours.

‘Grotesque’

He said that in recent years instead of the promised ‘trickle down’ of wealth in the economy, there had been “a grotesque trickle up” for the few who’d benefited under austerity.

The shadow chancellor also warned that the prime minister was set on a course towards a “dystopia” where the poorest and most vulnerable would suffer most.

Whatever the deal struck on Brexit he believed jobs, prosperity and the public finances had to be at its heart. On that point McDonnell added that the party backed the “reasonable management of migration.”

He said, “There is a robust economic case to be made for the benefits of free trade over the perceived cost of migration. And Labour is prepared to make this case.

“It is not migrants to blame for low pay and insecurity at work, or the high cost of housing, it is the failure of our whole economic model, which is not supplying the investment in work, or in housing, that people need. We have to change the model.”

Labour would, he added, “put the national interests first” by offering “a People’s Brexit for the many.”