The great ‘EU Reset’ of 19 May – when the first formal UK-EU summit since Brexit will take place – is rapidly approaching. Yet even before Keir Starmer and EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen meet in London to thrash out an agreement, advance attempts to sell the new relationship are growing.
That so much surrounding Monday’s UK-EU summit in London is being kept secret on either side of the Channel is auspicious
‘UK wins £500m in science grants from EU Horizon scheme after Brexit lockout,’ the Guardian excitedly told its readers earlier this month. It claimed that British scientists were ‘over the moon’ with Britain’s return to the EU’s flagship science research programme.
The Guardian’s positioning, like that of the Remainer lobby more generally, is a template for Labour’s ‘reset’ and subsequent after-sales service. Britain, we’re told, will benefit dramatically from access to EU markets and programmes that Brexit has denied her. However, a closer look at Britain’s return to the Horizon scheme (under the Conservatives) reveals the true nature of what Labour’s EU ‘reset’ is likely to replicate in a host of areas.
The EU’s official press release of 4 December 2023 stated that from 1 January 2024, the United Kingdom became an associated country to Horizon Europe. Its researchers were able to participate in the research and innovation programme of the EU on the same terms as researchers from other associated countries with access to Horizon Europe funding. Naturally, this required Britain to pay into the Horizon fund. The UK contribution is set at an average of 2.43 billion euros (£2 billion) annually. After its first year of Horizon membership, British scientists may indeed have secured half-a-billion pounds in Horizon funding. But if Britain paid out over two billion pounds to get it, that hardly seems like a good deal. Rather than feeling ‘over the moon’, British scientists should be feeling ‘sick as a parrot’.
Imagine then the losses if on this basis Labour were to sign Britain up to the EU’s defence procurement Security Action for Europe (SAFE) fund, as mooted. To access the EU’s €150 billion (£126 billion), the UK will be required to make a massive financial contribution. However, as a non-EU member, the UK would have limited influence over how these funds are allocated, with the French likely to set tenders orientated towards its defence industry strengths. This raises concerns about paying into a system without proportional say in its governance. The implications for Britain’s defence autonomy, jobs and defence know-how will be irreparably harmed, not to mention the likelihood of her never recouping her annual contributions.
What is also significant in Horizon for the forthcoming EU ‘reset’ is how it is embedded in the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement. Any failure on the part of Britain to comply with aspects of Horizon could mean Brussels taking action against the UK in areas not germane to science, but across the wider trade spectrum. Apparently this embedding in the TCA is the template for the forthcoming ‘reset’, putting Britain’s wider trade interests disproportionally at the mercy of the EU. If the whole was then put under the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice, one of Britain’s major Brexit freedoms will have been sacrificed.
This week in a broadcast to the nation, French president Emmanuel Macron raised the possibility of putting France’s strategic nuclear weapon at the disposal of the EU. How this would work has not been detailed. Macron claims that France would have ultimate say over its use. But the prospect raises major fears across France from Gaullists to the Rassemblement National.
France has lived for the last half century with national consensus on the legitimacy of its independent nuclear weapon from left to right in what has been dubbed Gaullo-Mitterrandian defence unity. Talk of Britain’s nuclear weapon being too expensive to upgrade, the erroneous suggestion that Britain’s nuclear deterrent is not truly ‘independent’ from US control, or that the US could deprive Britain of warheads (that are sent to the US for maintenance), could see the cash-strapped Labour government finding the prospect of throwing in aspects of our nuclear deterrence into a broader EU defence and security agreement appealing. Many Labour and Lib Dem nuclear sceptics would be delighted at the prospect.
The fact that so much surrounding Monday’s UK-EU summit is being kept secret on either side of the Channel is auspicious. The EU is notoriously ‘leaky’ on such issues, demonstrating that, in this case, they are on to a winner and fear a breach could threaten the deal. Meanwhile, Labour seek to stage manage the ‘reset’ on their terms. Advance notice would give Reform and the Conservatives an opportunity to undermine the presentation that is certain to be Guardian-like in its triumphalism.
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