Tony Blair urges Burnham to pursue Britain's return to EU

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LONDON — Britain should seek to rejoin a reformed European Union within the next decade, ex-Prime Minister Tony Blair said in a report published Thursday.

In the foreword to a paper published by his think tank, the ex-Labour leader said Britain “must be in the room shaping Europe’s future.”

The Tony Blair Institute for Global Change argues Britain’s return to the bloc should be a “cornerstone” of the U.K. government’s upcoming 10-year plan — but only if Brussels is serious about reform.

New British Prime Minister Andy Burnham promised when he took office in July that he would lay out his vision for the next decade later this year

In the report, Blair writes: “We should be clear that we want back into a formal relationship with the EU. But it must be a Europe on a credible path to reform, a Europe of nation states, a Europe capable of being a genuine global power.”

Failing this, the U.K. should cooperate with Europe where interests align, but show that “it can and is prepared to remain independent,” Blair added.

The Tony Blair institute report warns Britain must move away from the old Brexit rhetoric and the “red lines” in the Labour party’s election-winning 2024 manifesto.

Co-operation between the U.K. and its European partners should be encouraged through new shared institutions, such as turning the North Sea into a shared energy hub, joint work on AI, and joining the EU’s Security Action for Europe (SAFE) loans for arms scheme, the report suggests.

Blair has been consistently opposed Britain’s withdrawal from the EU. He described the country’s referendum result as “the most serious it’s taken since the second world war.”

In 2017, the former prime minister said that he would make it his “mission” to persuade voters to “rise-up” and change their minds on Brexit.