Labour will only agree to support a general election if Boris Johnson promises he will never pursue a no-deal Brexit, the party has said, insisting even a delay until 31 January would not be seen as sufficient reassurance.
With Labour under increasing pressure to back an election, and both the government and a Liberal Democrat-Scottish National party group coming up with competing plans to force one, Jeremy Corbyn said a three-month Brexit pause would not be enough to trust the prime minister.
“No, because it’s still there in his mind, it’s still there in the bill, and it’s still there as a threat,” he told TV reporters after addressing a trade union conference in Ayr.
“It’s got to be completely removed before we’ll support an election. We want an election as soon as that’s removed and it’s in his hands to do so.”
Speaking earlier on Sunday, the shadow home secretary, Diane Abbott, said only a promise from Johnson to MPs would suffice.
“He could come to parliament and categorically give parliament an undertaking that he’s not going to come out without a deal,” she told BBC One’s The Andrew Marr Show.
“But he won’t do that, because coming out without a deal is something that people around him like Dominic Cummings would want, because then it becomes not just Brexit but a Trump Brexit.”
As well as the economic impact, Abbott said, no deal would hamper international cooperation in areas such as policing, citing the investigation into the deaths of 39 people whose bodies were found in the back of a lorry in Essex last week.
“If we crash out without a deal, we have no access to the European arrest warrant, we have no access to Europol, we have no access to all sorts of important databases,” she said. “We cannot crash out of the EU without a deal, and Labour will do anything in its power to stop that.”
But Abbott said she would welcome an election. “Labour’s attitude to an election is, we’re up for [it]. We have over half a million members and they want an election. I don’t think any of us believe that Boris Johnson should be in power for a minute longer than is necessary,” she said.
However, many Labour MPs, and a number of shadow ministers, are wary about agreeing to an election given recent polling, with the Conservatives leading by up to 16 points.
One senior MP said Labour’s coherence on the issue could be tested if the EU agreed to an extension until 31 January. “I get the impression we have quite a unified position as things stand. If the EU granted a long extension, that may change,” they said.
Labour is poised to oppose a government motion on Monday for an election under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. This requires two-thirds of MPs to back it, giving the party an effective veto.
However, another route could be calling for an election via a bill, which would need only a simple majority, with both the Lib Dems and the government suggesting this as a route.
At the same time, Johnson and his ministers hope to resume efforts to push the withdrawal agreement bill through parliament.
In an interview broadcast on Sunday, Tony Blair said Corbyn should use the passage of the bill to eliminate no deal.
“The sensible thing for him to say to Boris Johnson is, ‘Yes, I’ll agree to your general election, but you’ve got to agree to timetable proper scrutiny of your bill and allow us to amend that so that we rule out no deal as the outcome of the future negotiation’,” the former prime minister told BBC Radio 4’s Westminster Hour. “Because otherwise, Jeremy Corbyn hasn’t prevented no deal.”
Blair said he would rather Brexit were decided by a second referendum, which, he argued, could take place simultaneously with a general election. “You can deal with them both on the same day if you want. But you should deal with them separately,” he said.
