Labour Future: Post-Brexit vote pressure group launched to help party 're-engage' with working class

A top Labour donor is planning to launch a post-EU referendum pressure group in a bid to make the party more electable after the UK voted to split from Brussels, IBTimes UK has learned.

Entrepreneur John Mills was initially one of the senior business figures behind the Vote Leave campaign, before quitting as the organisation's deputy chairman amid allegations of in-fighting.

The millionaire founder of JML, who gave Labour £1.65m ($2.16m) in his company's shares in 2013 and was part of the 1975 campaign to leave the Common Market, also set up Labour Leave ahead of the EU referendum.

The Eurosceptic group had the support of handful of Labour MPs, including Kate Hoey and Graham Stringer, and campaigned for a Leave vote from the left.

Sources close to Mills told IBTimes UK Labour Leave will continue to exist, with the aim of holding Westminster to account over the Brexit result, while a new group called Labour Future will be formed.

The organisation, which will launch a website in the coming weeks, will focus on developing Labour Party policy post-referendum to "make sure that the party is electable again".

"One of its founding principles is that the Labour Party significantly disenfranchised its traditional working class supporters by officially campaigning for Remain during the EU Referendum, and that now the party needs a 'reset' to re-engage with these people," the source added.

The news comes after Labour was thrown into turmoil after the EU referendum, with some of the party's heartlands in the Midlands and north of England backing a Brexit.

A string of shadow ministers quit Jeremy Corbyn's top team over his performance during the campaign and 172 Labour MPs backed a vote of 'no confidence' against the left-winger.

The party is now facing a leadership election, with Corbyn's sole challenger Owen Smith promising to hold a second EU referendum to "ratify" Brexit.

Elsewhere, former shadow business secretary and Remain campaigner Chuka Umunna launched the Vote Leave Watch group. The campaign is dedicated to hold the Vote Leave campaign and its allied to account for their "overblown and misleading" claims during the referendum.

Brexit Secretary David Davis has indicated that the UK government will not trigger Article 50 of Lisbon Treaty, the official mechanism to split from the EU, until 2017. The move means Britain will not break away from Brussels until at least 2019 after around two years of negotiations.