Sir Keir Starmer has insisted he will lead Labour into the next general election as he argued for closer links with the EU, saying Britain is “turning our back” on the Brexit years.
The prime minister warned that the split with the EU had left the UK unable to use its influence internationally.
In an interview after the worst week of his tenure in No 10, he added: “We are not reversing Brexit but we are turning our back on the Britain of the Brexit years that we’ve had for the last decade.
“That has seen a Britain that has turned inward, a Britain that has not been able to assert itself and influence others on the world stage or the European stage.”
He also admitted that appointing Peter Mandelson as US ambassador was a “mistake”, two weeks after the scandal surrounding the Labour grandee first engulfed the government.
Sir Keir has faced calls to resign as the controversy has rocked Downing Street.
But, speaking to the Sun on Sunday at the Munich Security Conference, he came out fighting against suggestions he should quit.
He said: “I won the leadership of the Labour Party when people said I wouldn’t. I changed the Labour Party when people said I couldn’t. I won an election when people said we wouldn’t.
“And now I intend to change the country – whatever other people say.”
Sir Keir also insisted he would “absolutely” lead the Labour party into the next election. He said he would not list his mistakes “in rank order” but appointing Lord Mandelson was one of them.
Speaking at the conference, Sir Keir had earlier insisted he “ended the week much stronger” than he started it after a period of political turbulence.
He also said the UK should more closely align with the EU economically as well as on defence.
He argued the UK should “move closer to the single market” in certain markets, where it was in the interest of both sides, just months before the tenth anniversary of the Brexit referendum result which ultimately took Britain out of the EU.
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar had said last Monday that the prime minister should quit in the wake of the scandal around Lord Mandelson’s links to the paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
But the attempt to oust Sir Keir failed, with members of the cabinet publicly backing the PM in the hours after Mr Sarwar’s statement.
But fresh questions about Sir Keir’s judgement emerged later in the week in a row over the appointment of his former spin doctor Lord Doyle to the House of Lords – after the aide hit the headlines for campaigning for a paedophile councillor.
The departure of the head of the civil service Sir Chris Wormald also prompted criticism of negative briefings in government, while senior Labour women suggested the string of scandals had exposed a “boys’ club” within Downing Street.
Sir Chris was the third senior figure to quit the government in the past week, following Sir Keir’s chief of staff Morgan McSweeney and communications director Tim Allan.
