Reported by The Guardian
On Brexit, devolution and investment, the former chancellor is eerily in tune with the man who sacked her
Which senior politician has argued that “Brexit did deep damage” and that the government seeks “not to turn back the clock but to look toward a new and stable, future relationship?”
It was not Andy Burnham, who has been the torchbearer for thinking the unthinkable on Brexit since he became prime minister. Instead, these are the words of the former chancellor Rachel Reeves, in a lecture six months ago.
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Reeves has taken a more thoughtful approach on how to come to terms with life outside government than some of her fellow former ministers.
A speech at Harvard on Monday will be her first public intervention on her own record and on Britain’s future, wisely left until after John Healey’s first budget .
She will say no one in government could “be in any doubt” about her view on the damage of Brexit – and her belief that one day the UK should return to the EU fold. “Economic interests, common values and basic geographical reality all point towards Europe,” Reeves will say.
The speech, which will examine how governments can meet the public’s appetite for radicalism while maintaining credibility with financial markets, will say that pursuing a closer relationship with the EU, even rejoining, may be credible as well as radical.
“Economically, it is the credible choice. Britain’s values, and a serious assessment of the geopolitical scene today, tell us it is the radical choice too,” she will say, giving Burnham “credit for his willingness to face reality head on”.
The Treasury, where the blueprints for the Remain campaign’s “Project Fear” were drawn up, has always been the heart of pro-European sentiment in government and Reeves its biggest champion under Keir Starmer .
Her sentiment seems more aligned though with that of Burnham, who cast her out of government, than with Healey, her successor as chancellor. He has joked about his own age when asked if the UK would rejoin the EU “in his lifetime”, saying it was his job to “try…