"The next election is an opportunity to turn the page on the post-Brexit rancour of the past," Lammy, 51, told reporters in London on Friday. "I want to get back to structured dialogue with the European Union on the issues that matter. "Labour has enjoyed double-digit leads over the Conservatives for about 18 months, so Lammy has been laying out his vision for UK diplomacy.He calls it " progressive realism " that combines the fact-based approach of arguably Labour's most famous foreign secretary, Ernest Bevin, with the idealism of Robin Cook, who served as Britain's top diplomat in the late 1990s.Bevin helped establish Nato and pushed for Britain to acquire nuclear weapons, while Cook oversaw successful interventions in Kosovo and Sierra Leone before resigning from Tony Blair's cabinet over the invasion of Iraq. "That's part of the discussions that we'll enter into," said Lammy.Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who voted to leave the EU, has yet to announce the date of the election but it must be held by January 28, 2025.If Labour wins, analysts expect to see Britain engage more with global bodies.Sunak became the first UK leader in a decade to skip the UN general assembly last year while Tories regularly call for Britain to quit the European convention on human rights. "There will be greater focus on the reform of international institutions," and "a renewed push for the UK to promote its international leadership on climate policy", Sophia Gaston of the right-wing policy exchange think-tank told AFP.
