EU referendum: Jeremy Corbyn is now genuinely against Brexit - but is it too little too late?

Jeremy Corbyn was never going to be the most convincing cheerleader for the European Union.

When Britain voted by a margin of 67 to 33 to stay in the European Economic Community in 1975, the Labour leader – then a councillor in the London borough of Haringey – was among the minority who voted Out.

His attitudes to Europe have evolved since. The ‘social Europe’ of common workers’ rights, poverty reduction and welfare, has always appealed. But after the Maastricht Treaty of 1992, he began to see the EU as a vehicle for precisely the kind of free-market-at-all-costs ideology that he abhors.

By the time he stood for leader in the summer of 2015, his Eurosceptic views had been reinforced by the EU’s handling of the Greek debt crisis. The grinding austerity enforced on Greece led him to say, in an LBC Radio debate during the Labour leadership contest: “If Europe becomes a totally brutal organisation that treats every one of its member states in the way the people of Greece have been treated at the moment, then I think Europe will lose a lot of support from a lot of people.”

It’s not quite a ringing endorsement.

Indeed, it wasn’t until he had been elected Labour leader that he categorically ruled out support for Brexit. Not to have done so would have risked all-out revolt within the parliamentary party and would have alienated a large section of the membership – particularly the young – who are so firmly behind the Labour leader.

But those who say he is still, in his heart of hearts an Outer, however, are probably wrong. Shadow Cabinet colleagues say that in private conversations he has made clear that he genuinely believes that, despite his reservations, staying in is the best course for the country.

Still, there is no denying that his campaigning in the referendum has been lacklustre. Different explanations are offered for this.

Some Labour MPs believe the party’s official EU campaign, Labour In for Britain, led by party grandee Alan Johnson, was from the outset too distant from the leaders’ office. Mr Corbyn and his team, already ambivalent about Europe, were happy to let Mr Johnson and the Labour In office plan the schedule, the timing and the message, and were therefore slow to react when it became apparent, through polling, that it was Mr Corybn himself who Labour voters most trusted on the issue.

Mr Johnson and other Labour figures have also, understandably, pointed out how hard they have had to fight for airtime and column inches while broadcasters and newspapers were, also understandably, fixated with the political drama of Conservative politicians tearing shreds off one another.

With internal Labour Party and Remain campaign polling showing support for Brexit at alarmingly high levels, David Cameron and the Tory figureheads of the Remain campaign cleared the stage for Mr Corbyn and Labour last week. A show of shadow Cabinet unity and a speech by Mr Corbyn – in which he effectively dismantled the Leave campaign’s claim to be champions of the NHS – quickly followed.

Was it too little too late? Only the outcome of the referendum will tell. If Britain votes to leave, there will be those who pin the blame on Mr Corbyn. But many senior Labour figures are now facing up to the fact that the party’s problem in this referendum runs deeper.

“In our industrial heartlands, there is no getting away from the issue of immigration,” Labour In figurehead Chuka Umunna said last week. Other MPs speak gloomily of staunch support for Leave on the doorstep in lower income, urban Labour areas. Immigration, again and again, is offered as the reason.

The question of how to address the issue is not a new one for Labour. For years its leading figures had been more or less unambiguously pro-immigration. Only when the party began haemorrhaging votes to Ukip ahead of the last election did Ed Miliband attempt to address the issue, with a halfway house call for “controls on immigration” that looked too much like lip service to win back many votes.

Now, in Mr Corbyn, they have a leader who is whole-heartedly pro-immigration. Shadow Cabinet colleagues say he takes a highly principled line on it – it is good for the country and the only problems are those caused by employers undercutting workers’ wages.

His positive stance is admired in some sections of the party, especially amid mounting unease about the tone of the EU referendum debate and fears of the rise of more virulently anti-migrant sentiment in Britain.

In other quarters there are concerns that the leader will not be able to grasp the nettle and properly address Labour voters’ concerns about migration – risking a further exodus of working class supporters into the hands of Ukip or, in the event of Brexit, a ruling Tory party with a mandate to shut the borders to EU migrants.

If Britain votes to Leave, it could be taken as a sign among Mr Corbyn’s opponents in the party that Labour – and its leader – underestimated scale of public concern about immigration, weakening their position. If Remain wins, immigration could still become a divisive issue within the leadership. The party’s deputy leader Tom Watson added his voice last week to calls for reform to the EU’s freedom of movement rules, in a bid to convince supporters that Labour backs Remain, but is serious about controlling immigration. The UK has the EU presidency in 2017 and a significant opportunity to push for such changes.

Against this backdrop, Mr Corbyn will face a choice between ‘doing a Miliband’, and offering half-hearted support for moderate reforms to immigration controls, or sticking to his guns and arguing that current levels of migration are sustainable and good for a country with an ageing population. Many in his party feel the same, even if they fear their voters do not. Others fear further erosions of the party’s support in its northern heartlands.

It all adds up to another potentially damaging schism within the Labour Party, at a time when they will also face an almighty row over the renewal of the Trident nuclear missile system. Whatever the outcome of the EU referendum, Jeremy Corbyn’s difficult reign as Labour leader shows no signs it will get any easier.

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The EU referendum debate has so far been characterised by bias, distortion and exaggeration. So until 23 June we we’re running a series of question and answer features that explain the most important issues in a detailed, dispassionate way to help inform your decision.

What is Brexit and why are we having an EU referendum?

Does the UK need to take more control of its sovereignty?

Could the UK media swing the EU referendum one way or another?

Will the UK benefit from being released from EU laws?

Will we gain or lose rights by leaving the European Union?

Will Brexit mean that Europeans have to leave the UK?

Will leaving the EU lead to the break-up of the UK?

What will happen to immigration if there's Brexit?

Will Brexit make the UK more or less safe?

Will the UK benefit from being released from EU laws?

Will leaving the EU save taxpayers money and mean more money for the NHS?

What will Brexit mean for British tourists booking holidays in the EU?

Will Brexit help or damage the environment?

Will Brexit mean that Europeans have to leave the UK?

What will Brexit mean for British expats in Europe?