Latest news with #EUreferendum
The Guardian
05-08-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Brexit has been a resounding disaster. Starmer must find the courage to change course
Brexit isn't working, and the British people know it. Poll after poll, including that unveiled this weekend by More In Common for the Sunday Times, shows that people are feeling the terrible damage caused by the deal forced upon us by Boris Johnson, Kemi Badenoch and the rest of the Conservative party, and want something different. The latest shows less than a third of Britons would vote to leave the EU if a referendum were repeated. There's no doubt that fundamental change is needed. There's no doubt the public will is there to make it happen. The question is: will Keir Starmer seize the moment and deliver it? There are big prizes on offer if he does. Giving our economy the boost it desperately needs, pulling it out of the cycle of low growth and high debt that the Conservatives plunged us into. Helping to raise more funding to lift our NHS and other public services off their knees. And, crucially, showing people that there is a better, more hopeful way forward than the nasty, nonsensical 'solutions' they hear from Nigel Farage and his fellow snake-oil salespeople on the right. Because people are, understandably, fed up. After so many failures of Conservative and Labour governments, people's faith in politics is at an all-time low. Many people just don't believe that any government of any party can really make their lives better. And beyond our shores, they see a world rife with conflict and instability, making it even harder to envisage our domestic challenges being solved. It's no surprise that all this disillusionment is fuelling the rise of rightwing populists such as Farage. Restoring faith in politics is critical if we are to save our country from a Reform UK-Conservative coalition of chaos. And acting decisively to fix our broken relationship with Europe is Starmer's big chance. To be fair, the prime minister has made some tentative steps in the right direction. He has at least shown a willingness to take a more positive and pragmatic approach to Europe than his Conservative predecessors. He has talked about a youth mobility scheme and bringing down trade barriers in key sectors such as farming and energy. But so far, all these amount to little more than promises to 'work towards' new deals. For all the smiles at the 'reset' summit in May, there's very little in the way of concrete progress to date. Like so much of this government's record, it risks becoming too much like 'continuity Sunak': all process and promises, no real change. But with growth still flatlining, Donald Trump wreaking havoc on the global economy and populism on the march, this challenge is much too urgent for such timidity. Of course, we know why Starmer has been reluctant to go further. He's spooked by the combined threat of the Conservatives and Reform, both of whom are itching for the chance to plunge Britain back into the nasty Brexit wars of the past decade. Well, I say let them try. With so many serious problems in need of urgent solutions, the British people have absolutely no appetite for all that division and distraction, and they will have no truck with politicians who do. The way to see off the populist right isn't to cower in its shadow; it's to step up and offer a compelling, positive alternative. So what does that look like? The first thing the prime minister should do is raise his sights when it comes to negotiating with the EU. This can't be about the odd limited improvement for this sector here or that sector there. The government has to be far more ambitious than just trying to polish up the rough edges of Johnson's bad deal. Just imagine if, instead, the prime minister set a clear target of leading the UK into a new customs union with the EU by 2030. That could be truly transformative. It's the single biggest thing the government could do to turbocharge our economy in the medium and long term. It would set us firmly on the path back to the single market, with all the benefits that would bring. It would be a game-changer – not just for our economy, but for the future of British politics. And not only that. A clear commitment to work towards a customs union would unlock big benefits for the UK now. It would give us the power to finally sign a veterinary and plant health agreement to boost British farming, and secure that youth mobility scheme to give our young people incredible new opportunities to live, work and travel across Europe, while also helping British employers to recruit the workers they need. Or even something less headline-grabbing but potentially just as impactful, such as joining the European Union Aviation Safety Agency. Post-Brexit rules mean that air cargo firms – such as the one run by a constituent of mine – can't have repair work done in Europe, apart from by the single German workshop that is recognised by the UK. It means they have to fly their planes all the way to the US just to get them serviced – at huge expense. With a more ambitious approach to Europe, we could get rid of that ridiculous red tape, and so much more like it. We could free British businesses to get on with their work, create jobs and grow our economy. That is the real change people across the country are crying out for. The opportunity is there and the rewards are great. I really hope the prime minister is listening. Ed Davey is the leader of the Liberal Democrats and MP for Kingston and Surbiton
Telegraph
03-08-2025
- Politics
- Telegraph
Fewer than a third of voters would back Brexit again, poll finds
Fewer than a third of voters would back leaving the European Union if the Brexit referendum were held again, a new poll has found. Just 29 per cent of people would vote to withdraw from the EU if a vote was held again compared to 52 per cent in June 2016, according to a survey for The Sunday Times. The More in Common research also found that nearly half of respondents believe there should be another referendum on whether to rejoin the bloc. The results represent a marked shift in attitudes towards being part of the EU less than ten years after the historic result in 2016. Supporters of Sir Keir Starmer's approach to restoring closer ties with European partners will see the results as a sign that the policy shift is the right move. The Prime Minister agreed a 'reset' deal in May with the EU that removed border checks and red tape on agri-food, making it easier to trade with European countries. But critics seized on clauses in the deal which give European fishermen access to the UK's coastal waters until 2038 and, and force Britain to follow EU rules on food standards. The issue of fish and being tied to the EU on trading standards, and therefore under the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice, were among reasons that Brexiteers originally advocated leaving the bloc. London and Brussels also agreed to hold future talks on a youth mobility scheme, under which an unknown number of EU citizens would be able to come to Britain each year. The poll found that the only voting groups for which the majority would still back leaving the EU were Tory voters, at 52 per cent, and Reform UK voters, at 68 per cent. Sir Keir was accused by Reform of ' trying to kiss goodbye to Brexit ' with his EU deal, with Richard Tice, the party's deputy leader, claiming it was 'surrender on steroids'. Elsewhere, the poll found that almost 30 per cent of voters want Britain to leave the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). Support for leaving the convention was at its highest among those who voted for Reform at the general election last year, at 68 per cent. But the survey also found that a majority, 58 per cent, think that Britain should remain in the ECHR, an increase of eight points since June. It was in June that Kemi Badenoch, the leader of the Conservative Party, announced that the party would conduct a review into Britain's membership of the convention, and that she was 'minded' it was necessary to leave. But last month Mrs Badenoch brought Sir James Cleverly, the former home secretary and Tory leadership rival, back onto her front bench. Sir James has refused to endorse her position on the treaty, having suggested before the reshuffle that quitting the ECHR would not necessarily lead to more foreign criminals being deported.
Telegraph
15-07-2025
- Politics
- Telegraph
Brexit was ‘sloppy but it's being straightened out', says Trump
Donald Trump said the UK's exit from the European Union was 'on the sloppy side'. But the US president said Brexit was now 'getting straightened out' before going on to praise Sir Keir Starmer in an interview with the BBC over the phone from the Oval Office. Mr Trump backed the Leave campaign during the European Union referendum in 2016, saying the UK would be 'better off without' the EU. Asked by the BBC if he believed the UK had made the most of Brexit, Mr Trump replied: 'No, I think it has been on the sloppy side, but I think it is getting straightened out.' The president also spoke about his relationship with Britain and Sir Keir Starmer. He said it was a 'great place - you know I own property there' and praised Sir Keir, saying: 'I really like the Prime Minister a lot, even though he's a liberal. ' He did a good trade deal with us, which a lot of other countries didn't do.' 'King Charles is a great gentleman' In September, the president will make an unprecedented second state visit to the UK, where he will be hosted by the King at Windsor Castle. However, Mr Trump will not address MPs – a courtesy afforded to Emmanuel Macron as well as some of Mr Trump's predecessors, including Barack Obama – because the Commons will not be sitting at the time of his visit. In the interview with Gary O'Donoghue, the BBC's chief North America correspondent, Mr Trump brushed away calls made by ally Nigel Farage to recall Parliament so he can speak to MPs. 'Let them go and have a good time. I don't want that,' he said. Mr Trump will be accompanied by his wife, first lady Melania Trump, for the trip, which is set to take place from Sept 17 to 19, and will be hosted at Windsor Castle. He said: 'I want to have a good time and respect King Charles because he's a great gentleman.' Warning shot at Putin Mr Trump's public attitude towards Putin has fluctuated during negotiations to end the three-year-long war in Ukraine. At times, since the start of his second term, he has been accused of taking a more sympathetic view of the Russian president. This included blaming Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine's leader, for starting the war, despite Russia invading Ukraine first in 2014 and then launching a full-scale invasion in 2022. As Putin continues to refuse a peace deal, however, their relationship appears to have soured. During his election campaign, Mr Trump promised to end the war within 24 hours of entering office. Mr Trump's tariff comments on Monday represented his most concrete threat to Putin, and in the BBC interview, he doubled down on his criticism. 'I'm disappointed in him. I'm not done with him, but I'm disappointed in him. 'You have a deal done four times and then you go home and you see he just attacked a nursing home in Kyiv. What the hell was that all about?' Asked if he trusted Putin, he paused for several seconds before replying: 'I trust almost nobody.' Nato no longer 'obsolete' The president has been a firm critic of Nato and has put considerable pressure on members to spend more on defence. But the relationship has improved since a Nato summit last month at which Secretary-General Rutte carried out a successful charm offensive, which involved calling the US president 'daddy'. In a meeting with Mr Rutte in the Oval Office on Monday, the president promised to send billions of dollars of military equipment to Ukraine in a deal paid for by other Nato countries. He said the weapons would be 'top of the line' but did not specify what they would be. Sources said long-range missiles may be part of the package. He told the BBC he no longer believed Nato was 'obsolete', claiming the alliance 'is now becoming the opposite of that, as it was 'paying their own bills'. 'I don't like to dwell on assassination attempt' The BBC interview was intended to mark the first anniversary of the assassination attempt against the president at an election campaign rally in 2024. Speaking about the shooting at the July 13 rally, he said: 'I don't like to think about if it did change me', as dwelling on it 'could be life-changing'. He said it 'happened very quickly' and that his only conscious thought was to 'let the people know' that he was ok. One attendee of the July 13 rally was killed and two others were injured in the shooting by gunman, Thomas Matthew Crooks, who was subsequently shot to death by Secret Service agents.
The Independent
11-07-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Macron is right – Brexit is to blame for Britain's immigration crisis
If there was one thing that symbolised what many still see as the fraudulent approach of Brexiteers during the EU referendum in 2016, it was the infamous bus promising £350 million extra a week for the NHS. But maybe Brexit critics should consider another image. In the words of Emmanuel Macron at a joint press conference with Sir Keir Starmer yesterday to unveil a one in, one out migration exchange deal, the real whopper was told by Brexiteers when Nigel Farage unveiled his controversial poster of thousands of migrants at the EU border with the words 'breaking point'. It came with a claim that if the UK did not leave the EU, it would be forced to accept all those preparing to stampede across Europe. In an epic rant at yesterday's press conference on the subject of Brexit, the French president, who refused to meet Farage during his three-day state visit, was clear that he considered this to be the biggest lie of all. To the obvious embarrassment of Sir Keir Starmer standing next to him, Macron did not hold back on how the promise of controlling immigration, both legal and illegal and putting an end to out-of-control numbers had been falsely used by those who wanted to leave the EU. He said: 'The British people were sold a lie that the problem was Europe. For the first time in nine years, Britain is being pragmatic.' But it is worth looking at the detail of what he said in terms of how leaving the EU not only failed to solve a problem but has made it worse. 'We need to understand that since Brexit, and I'll say this honestly, because it's not your case, prime minister, but many people in your country said that Brexit would help better fight illegal immigration. 'However, it is since Brexit that the UK no longer has any migration agreement with EU. So, for people wanting to cross, there is no legal admission way in, nor a way of sending people back after a crossing. This is a pull factor to attempt the crossing, exactly the inverse effect of what Brexit promised.' The French president was not wrong. The fact is that leaving the EU and simultaneously the Dublin Agreement neutered Britain's chances to simply return people to safe countries in the EU that illegal migrants travel through to get to the UK. The Dublin Agreement specifically allowed countries to send back migrants to the first safe country they arrived in, which was a bit more of a problem for countries such as Italy, Spain and some in Eastern Europe. It was also interesting to note Macron's claim that a third of all the illegal migrants in the Schengen free travel area of the EU were aiming for Britain because of its pull factors, including language, welfare benefits and the ease of working undetected in the black economy. Even on legal migration, we saw a huge increase after Brexit from what were already high levels, despite the 'take back control' message of the referendum campaign. Sir Keir pointedly noted that while he and the French president were discussing their 'groundbreaking' returns agreement, Mr Farage was out on the Channel taking pictures of boats packed with migrants coming over. He has been doing that since 2020, when, not coincidentally, the UK had left the EU and the small boats crisis quickly began. The Reform UK leader and others on the right will argue that the real problem is other aspects of international law, including membership of the European Convention of Human Rights or the Refugee Convention, which gives migrants the right to apply to stay in the UK because of family ties or for other compelling reasons. They want Brexit to continue as a process to withdraw Britain from this framework of international agreements drawn up in large part by the UK itself to help establish international order. It was the 'easy answers of populism' complained about by Starmer and Macron yesterday, and would lead to the UK being isolated just as Donald Trump, Farage's ally in the White House, is doing to the US. The legal framework had a safety valve in it while Britain was still part of the EU, but the lesson of 2016 is that once one part of an intricate network of deals unravels, then much else follows. Not surprisingly, Farage complained that Starmer's pilot 'one in, one out' deal was a betrayal of Brexit, taking Britain back to the EU. But as an exasperated French president noted, it was actually Britain 'being pragmatic for the first time in nine years'. It would be a great irony, given the nature of the 2016 debate, if migration, more than anything else, ends up being the reason the UK eventually unpicks the effects of Brexit and maybe even rejoins in the long term. The UK government is too embarrassed to address Macron's points at the moment, but the French president has shone a spotlight once again on the strong possibility that the biggest decision by this country in the 21st century was made based on a fabric of lies.
Telegraph
19-05-2025
- Politics
- Telegraph
Keir Starmer has re-opened the wounds of Brexit
One of the defining moments of the EU referendum, which occurred in the closing days of the campaign, was when pop star Bob Geldof was seen goading fishermen who had arrived on the Thames to demand a Leave vote in order to protect their industry. The sight of a very wealthy Remain-supporting celebrity mocking working people for their entirely legitimate concerns about the future of their livelihoods did not go down well with the voters, as was demonstrated a week later when the results came through. And now, displaying his acute political skills for which he is rightly famed, Keir Starmer has reopened the whole issue of fishing in his much-anticipated 'reset' of relations with the EU. French trawlers are to be given unlimited access to British waters once again, not for the next year, but for the next 12. That other pariah of Europe, Norway, which remains outside the EU but is part of the single market, gets to negotiate foreign fleets' access to its waters every single year. But Britain will have to deal with Starmer's new deal for more than a decade before the deal comes up for another renegotiation. To most people, none of this really matters. Despite the short-term outrage at Geldof's politically disastrous intervention in 2016, fishing rights don't occupy much head room for UK voters, so long as sufficient fish are available on supermarket shelves. And it appears that such apathy is well represented among our political leaders. For what is the UK to get in return for our beleaguered fishing communities? Quicker progress through passport control when you pop over to mainland Europe, apparently. Complaints from fishing organisations about Boris Johnson's trade deal back in 2020 centred on a reduction of access to EU markets for UK fish; none of that seems to have been addressed by this deal. Instead, the priorities of the people to whom Starmer listens most will be addressed: Remainers who constantly complain of young people's futures being 'stolen' by the end of freedom of movement will be somewhat placated if this reset results in Britain rejoining the Erasmus scheme for international students. And, of course, nothing irritates them more than having to wait a bit longer at the airport when visiting Tuscany. So if those issues can be sorted, or at least improved, what does it matter that a few thousand people living along the coast and who we never encounter at our local Waitrose anyway get the sharp end of the stick? The wider problem for Starmer isn't just that his reset threatens to reopen a national debate that was endlessly toxic and divisive, but one in which he personally helped make it even more so. A man who is already struggling to convince voters that he has hard and unshakeable principles, even if he can't quite identify them at the moment, should not want to remind those same voters, however they voted in the referendum, of his cynical manoeuvrings at the time. This is a man who, in direct disobedience to his then friend and leader, Jeremy Corbyn, promised Labour conference that he would ensure a rerun referendum giving the country a chance to overturn Brexit before it was finalised. My, how the conference hall cheered their saviour. Starmer had, in one fell swoop, guaranteed that he would succeed Corbyn as leader as soon as the next electoral calamity was out of the way. This was after Starmer's party had repeatedly promised to honour the result of the referendum, whether Remain or Leave triumphed. And here we are, back talking about issues we had all hoped had been put to bed. The scars on a country from the unnecessary divisions of Brexit have only just begun to heal and now they are re-opening – and just at the time when Nigel Farage's new party is running amok through council chambers and opinion polls.
