British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s first visit to Brussels was intended to bring rapprochement with the EU. But above all it explains where London will not move politically.
Britain is a complicated partner for Brussels. This insight was already true before Brexit and has become more solidified after the country left the EU. What caused anger in Brussels was that London recently repeatedly tried to water down the Brexit rules in the area of the internal market, which had been painstakingly lashed down, in its own favor. What was also rather confusing was that, given the political chaos in Great Britain, Brussels had to deal with constantly changing interlocutors. For this reason, few in the Brussels civil service mourn the unruly Brits.
The Prime Minister defines red lines for Brexit
The skeptics now see themselves confirmed. Keir Starmer, the new man at 10 Downing Street, was a guest in Brussels on Wednesday. But on his first visit, the Prime Minister struck the familiar British note: he defined several “red lines” for rapprochement. “There will be no return to the free movement of people, no return to the customs union, no return to the common internal market.” With this, Starmer put a damper on the EU Commission’s plans to at least allow freedom of travel for people between the ages of 18 and 30, at least for a year abroad. Since Brexit, EU citizens need a visa to stay in Great Britain again, and young Brits also need a visa to stay in the Union. According to the EU proposal, students should be allowed to stay in the target country for four years without a permit being linked to a permanent employment contract.
Reminder of British cherry-picking
After the Prime Minister’s visit, many things were reminiscent of the cherry-picking that the British were accused of when they were still part of the European Union. Those responsible in Brussels had hoped that the election of Keir Starmer would provide an opportunity to relax the relationship and put it on a new footing. The new head of government fueled such expectations because before his visit he spoke of a “restart” in relations. He wanted to try to make “Brexit work for the British people,” he wrote on the short message service “X” (formerly Twitter).
This sentence echoes the admission that the country’s exit from the EU is not the success story promised. Surveys are repeatedly published in which the majority of Brits want to be readmitted to the EU. Only one in ten Brits now sees Brexit as a success, as a survey commissioned by the London think tank “UK in a Changing Europe” showed a few months ago.
Difficult economic situation in London
The economic situation in the kingdom is becoming a problem. A majority of people now believe that leaving the EU has damaged the British economy. So far, the government in London has not managed to conclude agreements that make up for the losses in trade with the EU. The Brexit supporters’ plan was to replace the EU’s trade agreements with bilateral agreements with better conditions. But that was a complete failure; all we have to show for it are agreements with Australia and New Zealand. Experts are hesitant to quantify London’s economic losses as a result of Brexit. However, calculations indicate a loss of between three and five percent of gross domestic product.
A key Brexit promise has also failed: improving the healthcare system. There is a lack of money and staff in the NHS, and even cancer patients have to wait a long time for treatment. Another cause for anger is that the socially weaker sections have the feeling that they have to bear the negative consequences of Brexit alone. The gap between rich and poor has been widening for years. According to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), few other European countries and G7 industrialized countries have inequality as high as the UK.
The big problem of illegal migration
The promise that fewer people would immigrate to Great Britain after Brexit and that this would automatically create better-paying jobs for Brits also did not work out. Illegal migration also increased. For this reason, London is now trying to reach agreements with the EU to at least curb the influx across the English Channel. In the first eight months of this year, over 40,000 people have already arrived in the Kingdom.
In the area of immigration policy, the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the European Parliament, David McAllister, sees good opportunities for cooperation. Irregular migration to Europe must be “urgently stopped,” demanded the CDU politician. “However, Brexit has weakened the coordination of immigration policy on both sides and increased irregular migration flows,” explained the former Prime Minister of Lower Saxony. “Brexit is and remains a historic mistake with massive consequences, especially for the people and the economy in the United Kingdom,” emphasized McAllister.
London and Brussels want to continue meeting
In Great Britain itself, however, there is little desire to continue debating Brexit publicly. In surveys, a majority of Brits regularly say that they simply no longer want to hear about the negative consequences of Brexit. Of course, politics cannot orientate itself on this. Keir Starmer agreed another meeting with EU Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen in Brussels this autumn. There will also be regular summit meetings between the EU and Great Britain in the future. In terms of content, they want to tackle issues such as economic difficulties, irregular migration, climate change and energy prices together.
