Andy Burnham has denied proposing a return of free movement in talks between the UK and EU, saying any decision about the future relationship will be led by the will of the British people.
His comments came as two senior ministers expressed caution about the talk of the UK returning as a full member of the EU or single market and the consequences of a return to free movement.
The home secretary, Shabana Mahmood, said on Monday she wanted to abide by Labour’s manifesto, which ruled out free movement.
In an interview with ITV, Burnham said he wanted an “honest discussion” about how leaving the EU had affected migration, saying it was replacing temporary migrants from Europe with those from elsewhere who had more dependents and settled for longer.
“I have not proposed freedom of movement coming back,” he said. “I do believe that we should have an honest discussion with people about how immigration has changed since the Brexit vote because the shorter-term migration of people coming from Europe and then going back has been replaced with long-term settlement in bigger numbers, and that was the Boriswave.”
The prime minister said the EU summit in November would cement a deal on food and drink and emissions trading, as well as a youth mobility deal, and discussions would then move on to how the UK could secure a long-term stable deal with the EU, with all options on the table.
A draft text has been circulated among the 27 EU members, suggesting a final deal is close. The Guardian reported that UK ministers were prepared to spend as much as £450m a year to give students from the EU discounted university fees if Brussels allowed the UK access to its Made in Europe industrial programme.
Burnham told ITV that he believed public opinion had shifted on EU membership but he would “not run ahead of public opinion. The public need to be the boss when it comes to whatever happens with Brexit.”
He said for this parliament he was committed to the red lines in Labour’s manifesto, ruling out a return to the customs union, single market or free movement.
Mahmood, who introduced sweeping changes to migration rules in parliament on Monday, said she would not indulge the speculation about freedom of movement.
“What I am keen on is abiding by our manifesto,” she told Sky News. “The prime minister has himself recognised that there were significant issues with the free movement of people, and that should also be part of the debate that we’re going to have as a country about our Brexit settlement and what we do for the future.”
But she said there had been a loss of control over migration post-Brexit and said losing access to EU-wide databases had “had a very significant impact on us and our ability to manage migration into this country”.
Asked if she had been consulted about the prime minister’s comments, she said she had discussed the issue with Burnham.
“I think the prime minister said that he wants to have an open discussion,” she told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. “I think he’s got a position that actually most of the country can understand, which is we’re 10 years on from Brexit, it’s right that we have an open discussion about the terms on which we left and what the right thing is for our future.
“It’s also been really clear that we are absolutely bound by the terms of our manifesto. We had a manifesto commitment not to reopen in this parliament the question of freedom of movement, and that will not change in this parliament.”
The immigration minister, Anna Turley, told Sky she wanted to prioritise getting more young British people into jobs. “My priority is sorting out the system that we’ve got, getting young people in my constituency into work, making sure we’ve got an immigration system that is not chaotic, that is controlled, that we stop the illegal migration through small boats, that we get a grip on removals,” she said.
