Starmer IMO is foolish explicitly to rule out the customs union. It's clearly his long term hope that we will, if not actually rejoin, align much more closely again with the EU. But he knows that come the election the Tories will fight the Red Wall seats by saying that Labour will rejoin the EU. So he >has said that Labour will not seek to rejoin the EU or the single market, or join the customs union.
Starmer has a problem of course with these seats where Labour voters were roughly 70% Leave, in contrast with Labour members and voters generally who were majority Remain. But of course the electoral issue is primarily with the Red Wall seats which Labour must recover, and the belief is that they voted Conservative in response to Johnson's GET BREXIT DONE fantasy. And they might yet do it again. People don't like admitting they were wrong.
Politicians can only work, to a certain extent, within what people allow them. They can like it or not, however they'd do well to remember it. Ignoring people and/or telling them they voted wrongly is one of the reasons why we are where we are.
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