EU referendum: 'Very real prospect' Britain will vote to leave Europe, Andy Burnham says

Labour Shadow Home Secretary said his party had been 'far too much Hampstead and not enough Hull' in recent years

There is a “very real prospect” that Britain will vote to leave the European Union, Labour’s Shadow Home Secretary Andy Burnham has said, as he criticised his party for failing to reach out to all its supporters.

His comments came as two more Labour MPs joined a small group within the party campaigning for Brexit. Bassetlaw MP John Mann predicted his Westminster colleagues would be “shocked” by how many Labour supporters back Brexit on polling day and said immigration was the key factor in his decision.

Mr Burnham told BBC Newsnight that Labour had been “far too much Hampstead and not enough Hull” in recent years.

“Here we are two weeks away from the very real prospect that Britain will vote for isolation," he said.

"I think it would have a profound effect on our national life - the fragmentation that will come, the fear and the division.

"Those are all the things that the terrorists couldn't create with their bombs and yet we will have a situation where society becomes more divided."

Mr Burnham said his comments had not been a criticism of the Labour EU campaign, but a reflection on the party’s direction since 1994.

But senior Labour figures are growing increasingly concerned about the response to the EU debate encountered among supporters on the doorstep.

Writing in The Sun, Mr Mann said that many Labour supporters and councillors would back Brexit, claiming that the speed of immigration from the EU was “worsening inequality in the country” and putting pressure on schools and the NHS.

“I don’t want to live in a country with 80-90 million people living in it. I don’t want everything to be one big city. And the only way you can deal with that is by controlling borders,” he said.

But former Labour leader Ed Miliband hit back, saying that it was wrong to use immigration as an “alibi” to explain problems in public services.

Pointing out that levels of patient satisfaction in the NHS were at record highs in 2011, shortly after the Coalition government came to power - and at a time of high immigration - he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “I don’t think it’s immigration causing problems in the NHS it’s Jeremy Hunt and David Cameron.”

Labour’s official Remain campaign will today warn that Brexit could lead to £18 billion of further Government spending cuts as a consequence of the economic downturn most experts predict would follow a vote to Leave.

Deputy leader Tom Watson, will say: “Working people across the UK face a double threat if we vote to Leave: a massive black hole in the public finances, and an unfair Tory Government that will make ordinary families pay for it through further cuts and tax rises.

“Labour is clear that Britain is better off in Europe. It brings us jobs, growth and investment, protects British workers and consumers and helps keep us safe. Leaving would put that at risk.

“People like Boris Johnson and Michael Gove might be able to afford that risk – but millions of working people across our country simply can’t.”