Likely incoming Prime Minister Andy Burnham is minded to try to complete Labour\u2019s doomed Chagos Islands giveaway \u2013 the foreign policy blunder that played a substantial role in the downfall of Keir Starmer\u2019s premiership. The change of Labour leader presented an opportunity to drop the deal for good\u2026<\/p>\n
According to multiple sources who are familiar with Burnham\u2019s thinking, he has been heavily influenced by Starmer\u2019s National Security Adviser Jonathan Powell, whom he intends to keep in role initially. Powell referred to Britain\u2019s vital strategic territory as \u201cvery tiny islands<\/a> in the middle of the Indian Ocean where no one actually goes\u201d\u2026<\/p>\n Powell\u2019s personal commitment to the deal is absolute. Guido has exposed Powell\u2019s longstanding proximity to China<\/a> and fanaticism with completing the giveaway at all costs. Lord Hermer, the Attorney General, the other main advocate of the deal under Starmer, is thought to be leaving government. It\u2019s all up to Powell now\u2026<\/p>\n Continuation of Starmer\u2019s Chagos policy by Burnham will enrage the Trump White House and derail Burnham\u2019s wider attempt to reset relations with Washington. The President humiliated Starmer over the botched deal, publicly withdrawing US support and ultimately forcing the UK to ice the plan. Trump described Burnham has \u201cextremely liberal\u201d last month<\/a>. Wait until he hears about Burnham\u2019s plan to revive Chagos, which Guido understands the President is set to receive a briefing on shortly\u2026<\/p>\n Keeping Starmer\u2019s Chagos policy will also blow Burnham\u2019s balance sheet. Guido already established that Burnham\u2019s spending commitments so far total something like 250 billion pounds \u2013 much of that formally uncosted. You can add another \u00a347 billion to that then \u2013 the estimate of the cost of the Chagos deal alone\u2026<\/p>\n The Diego Garcia Bill was not reintroduced at the last King\u2019s Speech after a massive parliamentary campaign to halt Starmer\u2019s giveaway. Co-conspirators helped remove one Labour Prime Minister over Chagos, looks like it\u2019s time to do it all over again\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Likely incoming Prime Minister Andy Burnham is minded to try to complete Labour\u2019s doomed Chagos Islands giveaway \u2013…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":77459,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[7786,1504,5,6],"class_list":["post-77458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-uk","tag-andy-burnham","tag-chagos","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/116872355958092572","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77458"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77458\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}