More and more Britons are dissatisfied with the implementation of Brexit. After years of silence, the Labor Party is venturing back into the issue and calling for improvements. But party leader Starmer shies away from the debate about rapprochement with the EU.
Labor leader Keir Starmer once called for a second Brexit referendum, but now he shies away from a softer Brexit.
Since its resounding election defeat in 2019, Labor has given a wide berth to Brexit. Party leader Keir Starmer had issued the motto within the party that the issue should be avoided as best as possible. On the one hand, Starmer feared that a Brexit debate would open up internal rifts between urban remainers and Eurosceptic voters from the post-industrial north, who defected in droves to Boris Johnson’s Tories in 2019. On the other hand, Starmer didn’t want to give the Tories any additional leverage, since Johnson always branded him a pro-EU friend.
«Make Brexit Work»
But now Starmer has made a tactical volte and for the first time since 2019 in a keynote speech commented extensively on Brexit. With a view to the upcoming general elections in 2024, he ruled out that a possible Labor government would lead the country back into the EU internal market with free movement of people or into the customs union. “That would distract us from the real problems and block us for another decade,” said Starmer, who, as shadow Brexit minister under his predecessor Jeremy Corbyn, had fought for a second referendum on remaining in the EU.
At the same time, Starmer went on the offensive and criticized Johnson’s Brexit. At the end of 2019, the Prime Minister won the elections with the slogan “Get Brexit Done”, and now Labor is launching the slogan “Make Brexit Work”. Specifically, he brings a handful of practical improvements to the free trade agreement into play: Labor proposes simplifications for musicians who travel to the continent for performances, closer foreign policy cooperation and an agreement on the recognition of professional qualifications, which from a Brussels perspective would probably not be uncontroversial .
Most important is that Proposal for a veterinary agreement with the EU based on the Swiss model, in which the UK would adopt EU rules on the export of animal products. This would minimize the need for customs controls between the British Isles and Northern Ireland and thus also decisively defuse the dispute over the Northern Ireland Protocol. Such an agreement would result in a limited loss of sovereignty, but would ban the risk of a trade war – and secure important participation in the EU research program Horizon Europe, which Brussels is currently blocking because of the dispute over Northern Ireland.
Brits are becoming dissatisfied with Brexit
It is no coincidence that Starmer is now breaking the Brexit taboo. For one thing, surveys show that more and more Britons are dissatisfied with Brexit. A survey by the Ipsos institute last week concluded that 45 percent of Britons now feel that Brexit has made their life worse, while only 17 percent say it has improved.
In addition, the indications are increasingthat Brexit will have a negative impact on the British economy, at least in the short term, even if the effects of leaving the EU cannot always be clearly separated from those of the pandemic and the war in Ukraine. New hurdles are making cross-border exchanges with EU countries more difficult, and the UK has also recovered less quickly from the slump in foreign trade than other economies after the pandemic. The end of the free movement of people is a factor contributing to staff shortages and supply difficulties.
Clear commitment to leaving the EU
Against this background, there are also voices that want a much more offensive Brexit debate. Conservative MP Tobias Ellwood said recently, the reality of Brexit was different than people expected, which is why he suggested Norway-style entry into the single market. He remained alone in the ranks of the Tories. On the Labor side, on the other hand, the influential Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, is also calling for a return to the internal market and the free movement of people.
With his clear statement against a substantial softening of Brexit or a new EU accession, Starmer also tried to discipline his party. This should make it harder for the Tories to warn that Brexit would be reversed should Labor come to power. On the other hand, Labor is opening up flanks to the Liberal Democrats and the Scottish National Party (SNP). The SNP leader in Westminster, Ian Blackford, explainedthe anxious Starmer morphs into a pale imitation of Boris Johnson, giving Scots more reasons for independence.