Tories urge Starmer not to accept more EU influence amid drive for closer ties
Sir Keir Starmer must not accept further EU influence as he seeks closer ties with the UK’s nearest neighbours, the Conservatives have said.
As the Prime Minister prepares to meet European leaders in Belgium on Monday, Kemi Badenoch has called on Sir Keir to meet five “tests” which the Tories claim will maintain their vision for Brexit.
Mrs Badenoch, who supported the leave campaign in the Brexit referendum, has issued the challenge to Sir Keir following the fifth anniversary of UK leaving the European Union on January 31.
Backsliding
Among the tests she has called on the Prime Minister to meet are commitments to: no “backsliding” on free movement or the compulsory transfer of asylum seekers; no new money paid to the EU; and no reduction in fishing rights.
She also urged Sir Keir not to take any rules from the EU as he seeks to “reset” the relationship with the bloc, including dynamic alignment on trade standards, or allowing the European courts to have jurisdiction over UK law.
Nato must have “primacy” when it comes to European security, the Tory leader said in her final test for the PM.
“Five years ago the Conservatives broke the deadlock and got Brexit done,” Mrs Badenoch said.
She added: “We delivered the biggest democratic mandate in our country’s history. Keir Starmer and his Labour party opposed us every step of the way – they tried to cancel the referendum and stop us taking back control.
“Now Keir Starmer and the Labour Government are trying to reopen the divisions of the past and edge us back into the EU.
So I’m setting Keir Starmer five tests to make sure he doesn’t undo Brexit.
“These tests will ensure we seize the opportunities of the future and use our independence to grow the British economy. Under my leadership, the Conservatives will always stand up for Britain and fight for our hard-won freedoms.”
Freedoms
Alongside the five tests, the Tory leader also called on Sir Keir to maintain freedoms over the UK’s borders, taxes and financial services regulation.
She also urged the Prime Minister to maintain the UK’s right to pursue trade deals – including with the US – outside the EU customs union.
Environmental protections and business regulation must also remain in the remit of Britain’s leaders, the Tory leader said.
During his visit to Belgium on Monday, Sir Keir will join European Council leaders at an informal retreat ahead of an EU-UK summit later this year.
The Prime Minister will attend a working dinner expected to focus on defence co-operation.
He will later meet Nato secretary general Mark Rutte at the alliance’s headquarters in Brussels.
A Labour spokesperson described the Brexit “tests” as “yet more hypocrisy from Kemi Badenoch and the Conservatives who had eight years to make a success of Brexit but failed”.
They added: “After running an open border experiment that resulted in record high net migration, the Conservatives completely botched the job on Brexit – a record so bad that Kemi Badenoch herself publicly criticised Conservatives’ ‘mistakes’ on Brexit in her first speech as leader.”
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Nato should be didisbanded. Its never been much good and one of its nembers has threatened us. Not rxactly how I feel secure.Brexit failed as expected, time to grow up and get the country back on track
‘Now Keir Starmer and the Labour Government are trying to reopen the divisions of the past and edge us back into the EU.’ I think that’s arrant nonsense, because – for good or ill! – Starmer’s shown every indication, on repeated occasions, that he has no intention whatsoever of attempting to nudge Labour in that direction. And as various luminaries of the EU have on several occasions made clear, the EU would might only begin to contemplate consideration of a request to ‘rejoin’, in whole in in part, if it were clear that there was a broad political consensus within… Read more »
I think you’ll find the majority of politicians know fully well that Brexit has been an utter disaster. They also know that if any form of the hallowed growth is to happen – there has to be at least a rejoining of the customs union and single market.
I suspect that Starmer, alongside numbers of others, knows this very well in his heart, but nonetheless dares not ‘say it with his lips’.
Simply because, even now, too many voters still believe that Brexit was wholly the right thing to do, even if treacherous or incompetent politicians have messed up what could and ought to have been a triumphant progress! The signs are that this attitude is changing, but as of yet not sufficiently to reduce Brexiteers to an insignificant minority.
I think that that’ll come. But just not yet.
Leaving the EU has been an unmitigated disaster with a legion of evidence bearing this out. Moreover, the “leave” campaign prior to the Brexit vote (23/6/2016) was peppered with blatant lies hysterically aided and abetted by the high-circulation Tory London daily tabloids (Sun, Daily Mail and Daily Express). Even then the leave campaign could only manage 52% in favour. The last UK poll on Brexit (1/5/2024) showed that 31% of the UK population believed it was right to leave the EU, with almost twice, 56% believing it was right. This poll surely suggests it’s time for another Brexit vote.
I have one test. Did you vote brexit? Then you voted for a massive self harm session.