Morris calls for delay on euro referendum

The union chief Bill Morris has urged the Government to delay any referendum on the euro until a third term, warning that Labour could lose the next election if it failed to concentrate on improving public services.

Mr Morris, the leader of the Transport and General Workers' Union, said a postponement of the referendum on the single currency would "barely register on the Richter Scale of voters' indignation".

His call for a delay came after the former minister George Foulkes claimed that the referendum on British membership would take place in October next year. Mr Foulkes claimed to be in a position to make a "working assumption" about the date after talking to the Prime Minister.

The intervention by Mr Morris, an ally of the Chancellor Gordon Brown, makes him one of the most senior figures in the Labour movement to call for a delay in the poll. He said that while voters had little interest in the issues surrounding euro entry, a failure to improve public services could lead to an "electoral earthquake".

The official line taken by the Government is that no decision can be taken about a referendum until the Treasury has completed its review of the five economic tests set by Gordon Brown. The review will be completed by June next year.

Writing in The Times today, Mr Morris said that Labour was the only party that could successfully guide Britain into the single currency. "But to do so, it must win a third term. And that means that Labour has to honour its promises on public services," he said.

"The euro will still be there in the next Parliament. If its energies, resources, its time and its focus deviate from the task of delivering world-class public services, then a Labour Government may not be."