Conservative shadow energy secretary Andrew Bowie has accused Andy Burnham of being “very dangerous and divisive” after the prime minister confirmed that Russia interfered in the 2016 Brexit referendum.
Speaking to Times Radio on Monday morning, Bowie said: “That Brexit referendum was a legitimate vote. People voted in this country in record numbers to leave the European Union. And I actually think it’s very dangerous and divisive of the prime minister to reopen this debate in such an explosive fashion.”
Burnham confirmed the interference during an interview on the Rest is Politics podcast. According to the Guardian, he was not asked — and did not say — whether he believed the Russian activity affected the referendum’s outcome.
Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey praised Burnham for the statement. “I’m not going to agree with Andy Burnham on everything, but this statement needed to be said by a prime minister,” Davey said. “After the Conservatives suppressed the truth for years, this took courage. We must do far more to protect our democracy from attack by the Kremlin and other hostile states, before it is too late.”
Foreign Office minister Stephen Doughty said the result of the referendum stood regardless. “The result is the result, and I think the prime minister has been very clear that he’s talking about attempts to interfere,” he told Times Radio. “The security minister has spoken about this before. I’m confident that both the British people and the British state are able to respond to and defend against these types of threats, but we need to be very honest that those threats exist.”
Doughty later told LBC that the Russians “haven’t succeeded in their many, many attempts to undermine our democratic processes”.
The prime minister’s comments mark a break from the position taken by previous occupants of Downing Street. In 2020, the government’s response to the intelligence and security committee’s report on the threat posed by Russia stated that “we have seen no evidence of successful interference in the EU referendum”. Post-2016 Conservative prime ministers avoided casting doubt on the legitimacy of the leave vote, and Keir Starmer was also reluctant to address the issue directly.
Burnham is expected to make a statement to MPs later on Monday following the parliamentary recess, in which he will restate his view that Brexit has done more harm than good and argue for a closer relationship with the EU. He first set out that position at Labour’s conference.
At his own press conference on Monday morning, Reform UK leader Nigel Farage is set to announce that his party would suspend the asylum system for a full parliamentary term if elected, according to the Press Association. Under the plans, all asylum tribunals, legal refugee routes and resettlement schemes would be scrapped, around 90,000 outstanding asylum and humanitarian protection appeals would not be heard, and claimants would instead be deported.
Farage told The Telegraph: “The country is currently facing a national security emergency and the first duty of government is to protect its citizens. We cannot accept more asylum seekers while we still have no idea how many people are in the country illegally and the threat they pose. A Reform government will always put British people first and protect our borders.”
Reform also pledged to use tariffs to force other countries to take back migrants, and said cases of anyone granted asylum in the past five years would be reviewed by the Home Office.
Parliamentary business on Monday also includes a speech by AI minister Kanishka Narayan at 11am, questions to work and pensions secretary Pat McFadden in the Commons at 2.30pm, and a statement from home secretary Shabana Mahmood on the safety of MPs late in the afternoon. MLAs are due to vote on a no-confidence motion in Sinn Féin first minister Michelle O’Neill over her support for a protest against a proposed Orange Order march down the Garvachy Road.
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