Prime Minister Andy Burnham said Brexit "has done more harm than good" as he told Labour's conference in Liverpool that he will set out "different options" for the UK's future relationship with the EU. He did not reveal whether this would include rejoining the bloc.
PM's Brexit verdict
Mr Burnham said: "Brexit hasn't given us control." He argued that in fact the UK had "lost some of our control" over the economy and immigration.
He told the conference: "Later this year there will be a UK-EU summit" where immigration would be on the agenda. But he said better immigration controls, and future trade deals, are "not enough." Instead, the UK "must decide on a long-term relationship with what is still our largest market".
There are reports that the Prime Minister is considering including plans to reverse Brexit, and rejoin the bloc, in Labour's next election manifesto.
Policy announcements
Mr Burnham insisted "Brexit has done more harm than good ... so I will take the opportunity around the summit to lay out to you, lay out to the country, what I believe the different options are". He said this would "give us clarity about our position and the future of the continent that we live in".
In other announcements, Labour will fight the next election on a promise to introduce a form of proportional representation, Mr Burnham said as he announced a national commission on electoral reform.
A new National Care Service will be "free at the point of use", and impose no charges on the basic state pension, Mr Burnham announced. The Government will end the ban on public ownership of water companies, paving the way for the nationalisation of firms that do not "serve the public interest", he told the conference.
Pension and housing plans
Councils will be given the power to take over poor quality homes if landlords refuse to improve them, Mr Burnham announced. He confirmed he wants to end the current pensions triple lock, which guarantees increases in line with the highest of inflation, earnings or 2.5%, in order to free up cash to fund his long-held ambition of creating an NHS-style care service in England.
Mr Burnham, who replaced Sir Keir Starmer in No 10 in July, claimed there was a "sense of the powers-that-be pulling against the people, not with them". "If there's one thing I want to put right, it's that," he said.
Taking aim at the changes introduced since the Thatcher administration in the 1980s, Mr Burnham said: "Britain has been on the wrong path for a long time. Deindustrialisation. Deregulation. Privatisation. Austerity. Brexit. And what has it given us? A country run for vested interests, not in the public interest."
