Burnham Raises Prospect of UK Rejoining the EU a Decade After Brexit

Andy Burnham’s conference speech was hailed as bold, but he had saved his boldest move until today. In an interview this morning, Burnham raised the prospect of the UK rejoining the EU. That’s the first time a prime minister has talked about that since Britain voted to leave in 2016, as Bloomberg’s Alex Wickham points out.

Burnham’s gambit is a change of tune for him. As Mayor of Manchester he had talked about rejoining, but then when he ran in Makerfield, a Leave-voting constituency, in a by-election earlier this year he played the idea down. More recently, when Tony Blair raised it, Downing Street was cool.

But Burnham has now put the idea on the table ahead of the upcoming UK-EU summit, saying there are four options: the status quo, a customs union, single market membership, or going “all the way.” Already, France and Spain — regarded as two of the trickier members — have made warm noises about a UK return. While there’s some scepticism behind the scenes from Brussels, it’s still quite a change.

This EU play fits with the broader strategy of Burnham’s speech. He’s trying to unite the left bloc of British politics while the right remains divided. So he has embraced electoral reform, a national social care service and now this EU shift. All of these are things that Liberal Democrats and Green voters can get behind. His comments this morning open up the possibility of Labour fighting the next election on a rejoin platform.

Labour will also be fighting on the basis of ending the triple lock. People close to Burnham’s team said the triple-lock move was a modest overture to the bond markets: totemic enough to indicate seriousness while also underscoring he will deliver on his passion project, a national social care service. The PM’s team will be pleased that the markets rewarded them by barely responding to his speech (they’re waiting for next month’s budget).

The triple lock is the easier end of the welfare bill. Polling in recent weeks has shown that Labour supporters dislike the idea of ending the triple lock the least of any party (though even they don’t love it). It’s in no way as hard for his party as cutting disability benefits.

Burnham may have ruled out a snap election this week, but by appealing to the voters currently dispersed across the differing parties of the Left, he’s focused on the next election nonetheless.

Given all the hares he’s set running, it’s hard to see how he can really wait until 2029 before going to the country. It feels like the pace of British politics has sped up in the last 48 hours and we are racing towards another general election.

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Markets Today: FTSE in Fine Fettle

Hi, I’m Sam from Markets Today, and yeah, we’ve heard all the arguments that the FTSE 100 lacks excitement and investors still aren’t throwing money in its direction, but it is holding up really quite well.

The index is on track for a seventh quarterly rise in a row. That would be the best streak since one that ended in early 2006. Last time it managed this, Gordon Brown was delivering a budget and England’s “Golden Generation” was but months away from disappointing us once again by losing to Portugal in the World Cup on penalties.All the kinds of stocks one associates with the FTSE 100 have led the charge of this current streak. Banks, oil companies, miners, plus a sizeable contribution from Rolls-Royce. Yep, there’s no AI, chipmakers or memory storage. But quietly and without much acclaim, the UK’s index is doing just fine.

Things haven’t been so great for bonds or the pound. Benchmark 10-year gilt yields have jumped by the most since spring of 2023, and the pound is on track for its worst monthly decline against the dollar this year.

Both will likely be tested more by the budget this month. But let’s stay positive for now and give the FTSE its flowers.

Read the Markets Today live blog for rolling news and up-to-the-minute analysis during UK market hours.

The big number

0.5%The UK economy grew even faster than previously recorded during the second quarter.

One Big Story

Britain’s Young Jobseekers Try to Kickstart Their Careers AbroadOtis Walker, a graduate fresh out of Oxford University, never imagined he’d start his career in Hong Kong. The 21-year-old applied in vain to around a hundred entry-level programs in the UK, before changing tack.

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Allegra Stratton worked for former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak when he was chancellor and runs an environmental consultancy, Zeroism.

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