ESCALATING pressure for another referendum on European Union membership could “derail Labour’s chances more than any other campaign,” Trade Unionists Against the EU (TUAEU) warned today.

Anti-Brexit campaigners will march in Birmingham as the Conservative Party conference opens and organisers of a so-called “People’s Vote” march on October 20 are predicting a turnout of hundreds of thousands.

Another Europe is Possible says it is going to make an “intervention” on October 20 to give the pro-EU demo a “radical edge, with a sea of red flags, radical placards and banners, flares and an anti-Establishment tone.”

It hopes to mobilise large numbers of trade unionists, Labour Party members and Greens behind its call, and salutes a “major shift” in Labour policy which saw the party endorse the option of a second vote.

However, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn declared that the aim was to “get the best Brexit deal for jobs and living standards to underpin our plans to upgrade the economy and invest in every community and region,” with a general election rather than a second referendum the priority.

TUAEU spokesman Doug Nicholls said the attempt to give the anti-Brexit movement an anti-Establishment character was “confused and reactionary.”

He told the Morning Star: “The organisers misunderstand the Labour Party position, which is to seek a general election.

“The multinational corporations and unelected commissioners who run the EU will no doubt feel emboldened by news that they’ve convinced people to take up their cause and call it left wing.”

The People’s Vote campaign said Office for National Statistics figures showing reduced growth was a sign that “Brexit is already weakening our economy.”

Britain for Europe, whose local arm EU in Brum is organising the march on the Tory  conference, is one of the collaborating groups that make up People’s Vote, an umbrella organisation run out of Millbank Tower in Westminster.

Shadow chancellor John McDonnell agreed that Prime Minister Theresa May’s “disastrous handling” of Brexit had undermined confidence, but pointed out that “eight years of vicious austerity have had an appalling impact on the UK’s growth ... the Institute for Fiscal Studies recently confirmed that people are on average £800 worse off under the Tories.”