Labour is to commit to a multi-billion pound pledge to make up any shortfalls in funding for deprived regions and communities resulting from Britain's departure from the European Union.
The promise, to be announced on Monday at the party's annual conference in Liverpool by shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry, guarantees that future Labour governments will match EU structural funding currently worth 10.8 billion euro (£9.3 billion) over the period 2014-20.
With the backing of shadow chancellor John McDonnell, Ms Thornberry will announce plans for a fully protected fund to substitute for the lost EU schemes into the future.
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The fund will be a "central plank" of Labour's manifesto for the next general election and will be the party's top priority for any savings achieved from EU withdrawal - money which Leave campaigners including Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson suggested during the referendum campaign should be spent on the NHS.
Regions likely to benefit most from the scheme would be Wales, which is allocated 2.4 billion euro (£2.1bn) under the current seven-year programme, the South West, which is due to receive 1.5bn euro (£1.3bn) and the North West, with an allocation of 1.13bn euro (£979m).
Chancellor Philip Hammond announced in August that the Treasury will guarantee to back EU structural and investment funding projects signed before this year's Autumn Statement, in a move which could cost up to £6 billion a year up to 2020.
But Ms Thornberry will say: "For the period after, they have said nothing. That is not good enough.
"Without long-term certainty over funding, our most deprived regions and communities cannot plan ahead. They cannot attract other investment. They cannot make progress.
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"So thanks to John McDonnell, Labour's shadow chancellor, we can guarantee that a future Labour government will make up any shortfall in structural funding into the 2020s and beyond. And the same will go for the funding of peace and reconciliation projects in Northern Ireland.
"The communities who stand to lose out most from Brexit must be looked after first."
Labour will also commit itself to opposing any attempts by the Conservative Government to scrap any of the legal rights and funding programmes derived from Britain's membership of the EU.
It will publish a document setting out the full range of such benefits, which will state: "It could not be clearer that - of all the rights and investment protected by Britain's membership of the EU - one of the most significant, regional funding, is also one of the most directly and imminently under threat from the Tory Government.
"The Labour Party therefore commits that - as a central plank of our future manifesto and budget plans - we will establish a properly-managed domestic fund for less prosperous regions currently in receipt of EU structural funds, and we will ensure that level of funding is protected in full, into the 2020s and beyond.
"Funding this commitment will be our top priority for allocating the estimated net savings deriving from Britain's withdrawal from the EU."
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Current allocations of structural funding under the EU's 2014-20 scheme are:
- East of England 387m euro (£335m)
- East Midlands 598m euro (£517m)
- London 762m euro (£659m)
- North East 739m euro (£639m)
- North West 1,132m euro (£979m)
- South East 286m euro (£247m)
- South West 1,495m euro (£1,293m)
- West Midlands 909m euro (£786m)
- Yorkshire and Humber 794m euro (£687m)
- Scotland 895m euro (£774m)
- Northern Ireland 613m euro (£530m)
- Wales 2,413m euro (£2,088m)
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