‘Starmer’s EU deal is only going to get worse’

Keir Starmer’s ‘Brexit reset’ has brought Britain back into the EU’s orbit. The deal announced this week invites Brussels to meddle in several critical areas of British policy, from farming and fishing to energy and defence. So what has the UK got in return for surrendering so much sovereignty and control? According to Lord Frost, the chief Brexit negotiator for Boris Johnson, Starmer has gained nothing of any value. He sat down with spiked’s Fraser Myers to explain the contents of the deal and why it is such a disaster for the UK. What follows is an edited extract of their conversation. You can watch the whole thing here.

Fraser Myers: Keir Starmer has described the Brexit ‘reset’ as a win for both sides. Is he right?

David Frost: It depends what you’re trying to win. It’s certainly a win for the EU, because it’s brought significant areas of UK economic life back under their jurisdiction. If you’re Starmer, who thinks the purpose of this country’s existence is to get as close to the EU as possible, then it’s a win. But if you’re someone like me who backs Brexit, it is an extremely bad deal. It’s a big step backwards, and places us further under EU control. It should really be resisted.

Myers: Fishing has been one of the main focusses on this week’s front pages. What has the UK agreed to here?

Frost: Back in 2020, in the initial Brexit deal, we agreed to a five-and-a-half-year transition, after which we would get full control of our waters. We had hoped for two or three years, but it was a wider agreement, and we accepted there were trade-offs. The key point was that we regained sovereignty over our seas. Now, Starmer has extended the transition arrangements, giving the EU the right to fish in our waters for another 12 years. There’s no way, in 2020, that we would have agreed to a 17-year transition period. Yet that’s what Starmer has done.

Myers: What about food products?

Frost: It’s obvious that if you’re exporting food to the EU, you have to meet EU standards. Nobody has ever argued with that. But Starmer’s SPS (sanitary and phytosanitary) agreement means that every food item in this country will have to follow EU rules, even if you’re a trader that never exports to the EU. As a consequence, we won’t be able to pass laws that don’t align with the EU’s, and can’t import goods from any other countries that don’t meet EU standards – even if we’re quite happy with it ourselves.

Myers: We’re also going to align with the EU’s climate and energy policies. Isn’t this just going to send energy prices soaring?

Frost: That’s right. We’ve agreed to join the Europeans’ emissions-trading scheme. Again, we will be following their rules. One problem is that their carbon price is about 50 per cent higher than ours. Another problem is that we won’t be allowed to have Net Zero targets that are less ambitious than the EU’s. So if we want to escape Net Zero, and I really think we need to, we would only be able to do it with Europe’s blessing. And I think we know what the EU would say to that.

Myers: So, it’s safe to say that a huge amount of decision-making power has been given away here?

Frost: Yes. The deal may not have progressed into a legal text yet – negotiations still need to be made – but I would expect further concessions. The EU knows how to put the pressure on. They know that we can’t retreat from this now. I think this deal is only going to get worse as it becomes binding.

Myers: Starmer made a big song and dance about the new defence pact. What do you make of it?

Frost: This pact is really a big fat nothing. It’s simply a right to attend a load of meetings, possibly to be invited to join one or two EU institutions, all while psychologically and diplomatically angling ourselves back towards the EU. Why have we paid such a high price in sovereignty just to be allowed to talk about foreign policy and defence with the Europeans, which we can do anyway?

Myers: Starmer seems to think that closer alignment to the EU is an inherently good thing, as if it is this engine of prosperity and economic dynamism. Does that bear any relation to reality?

Frost: The idea that Europe does things better is deeply ingrained among the political class in Britain. It thinks Europe is superior in everything. The truth is that, since Brexit, Britain has been doing much better than Europe economically.

Europe is a disaster at the moment – we can see this with the rise in anti-system parties across the EU. I don’t understand why Labour, which used to stand for prosperity for working people, wants to tie us to it again.

Myers: What might a reset look like if a pro-Brexit government were to do it?

Frost: Fundamentally, I don’t think the deal we struck in 2020 needs any change. It just needs ongoing discussion, which is what happens with most trade deals. The one thing we would have liked to have done, but never could, was to get rid of the Northern Ireland Protocol. We tried in 2019, but the UK parliament said we couldn’t leave the EU without an agreement, so we had to go along with it in the end. These are a set of very constraining arrangements that have kept Northern Ireland in the Single Market and EU customs area. That needs to change. But the fundamentals of the trade arrangements, in my opinion, are fine.

Watch the full conversation here: