Starmer's latest freebie: British sovereignty in exchange for nothing
While we can't rely on the French to help police the Channel – despite paying them £500 million for the privilege, we can always trust our Gallic cousins to bear a grudge.
We already knew that the Prime Minister's great EU 'reset' was a sham; that much was clear when all we got in return was the use of e-gates that were already operational in many European countries.
Now, we learn that we may not even be granted access to the bloc's industrial defence programme, despite Sir Keir Starmer's insistence that defence and security was a central tenet of the deal.
As he boasted last month after selling us out to Brussels: 'We've also struck a new defence and security partnership to strengthen our cooperation and strengthen our security – which is vital in this dangerous new era.
'And it will open the door to working with the EU's new defence fund – providing new opportunities for our defence industry, supporting British jobs and livelihoods.'
Except, of course, the French have other ideas. In yet another example of just how bad Labour is at negotiating anything (see also the Chagos surrender and, more recently, the 'deal' to allow Spanish border guards to check passports on Gibraltar) we now learn that Emmanuel Macron is trying to shut out British arms firms from the European Defence Industry Programme (EDIP).
While different to the defence fund, which is known as SAFE (Security Action for Europe), EDIP will see cash pumped into joint procurement projects and the production of weapons, ammunition and other military hardware. It was created for the benefit of the EU and 'allies' but French diplomats have insisted the tool should be solely used to boost firms based inside the EU, as well as Norway and Ukraine – shutting out the UK.
So much for Starmer's boast that the reset deal would put Britain 'back on the world stage' and give us 'unprecedented access to the EU market, the best of any country.'
Labour is yet to reveal how many billions is being squandered on a reset that has already prompted another big fat 'non' from Paris.
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