THE prospect of a Boris Johnson majority is a “mortal threat” to the country, according to former Labour Foreign Secretary David Miliband on a rapid tour of the region yesterday.

Mr Miliband now lives in New York but was South Shields MP from 2001 to 2013 and is regarded by some on the Blairite wing of the party as the greatest leader it never had.

He went from Redcar to Sunderland via NetPark in Sedgefield, Tony Blair’s old constituency, where he said: “A Corbyn majority is not on the cards, and since every Johnson candidate has signed up to his version of Brexit, that’s a mortal threat to the economy of our country – that’s the biggest danger.

“It seems obvious that we are not going to have 325 Labour MPs at the end of this election, and the range of possibilities runs from a hung parliament to a massive Tory majority. Seats like Sedgefield are in the eye of the storm, and it is important that we have MPs like Phil Wilson, because if we don’t, you will end up with hardest of hard Brexit.

“You are being sold a pup here: the Johnson proposal is only the first stage of Brexit – we are going to be living, breathing and arguing about it for a long time to come because none of the hard questions have yet been addressed.”

Like Mr Wilson, who is defending his 6,059 majority in the seat, Mr Miliband believes that there should be a second referendum on Brexit.

“When you put in an offer on a house, you get a survey done, and when it comes back, if there’s subsidence you are allowed to not buy it,” he said. “We had no detail of what Brexit meant in 2016 and now we do have a version of Brexit on the table, let the people decide if they want to go ahead with the house purchase.”

Mr Wilson is being challenged by the Brexit Party, whose candidate David Bull looks likely to have leader Nigel Farage in the constituency for a second successive weekend, and Paul Howell for the Conservative Party.

Mr Howell said: “There is a very straightforward conversation going on – every door I knock, the first question I’m asked is ‘why haven’t we left yet’. In this seat, which voted 60/40 to leave, there is significant disenchantment that democracy isn’t seen to have been enacted.

“I think the biggest threat to our economy is uncertainty, and if you have another referendum, going back over this ground for six or nine months, that will create uncertainty, and what if there is a narrow result again – where will we go after that?”

Mr Miliband is now the chief executive of International Rescue Committee, a global humanitarian charity founded by Albert Einstein in the 1930s, which has 13,000 staff in 200 crisis spots around the world.

“We provide water, sanitation, health, education, employment and protection for people who are refugees from the war in Syria, or who are fleeing Myanmar, or on the run in El Salvador, or fleeing from south Sudan,” he said. “We work in the world’s war zones – we’ve got 480 staff in north-east Syria today. It’s a long way from South Shields but it is a way of putting my values into practice.”

However, he described the international climate as “toxic”. “There is a crisis in diplomacy, countries are trying to solve their own problems without solving global problems, and there’s a demonization of victims of war – President Trump doesn’t want to allow refugees into America because he says they are terrorists.

“There’s also a sense that the problems too big for us to solve, but if you don’t tackle them, they get worse and they have a wider impact – the Syrian civil war, as we know to our cost, is now impacting on European politics. “

He still has a house in Shields, and organises an annual lecture in the town. His speakers have included Danny Boyle and David Walliams, and this year his guest was Gary Lineker.

He started the 2010 Labour leadership election as favourite, but lost by the narrowest of margins to his brother Ed.

“We both took a vow that we would not say or do things that would haunt us for the rest of our lives and we have stuck to that loyally and faithfully,” he said.

Ed’s leadership was the start of Labour’s leftwards drift which has culminated in the party’s current position under Jeremy Corbyn.

“You can’t press the rewind button and reverse what has happened over the last nine years,” said David, when asked about the possibility of restarting his British career.

“Politics is about attracting the widest possible support to effect the largest possible change, but my role at the moment is as a voter…

“I’m here to support a number of colleagues who, like Phil, I admire, and to win as many Labour seats as possible – I saw the difference a Labour government made in constituencies like mine and this one.

“I want to reverse the trend of the country’s trend of detaching itself from the EU and I’m really worried that politics has become a source of disdain.

“There’s a desperate need to reconnect people with politics, and I think rather than running away from the European issue we have to walk towards it and engage with it.”