David Henig / Feb 2025
President of the European Council António Costa greets UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer in Brussels. Photo: Wikimedia Commons
There has been a change. For the first time since 2016, mutual smiles have become the norm when EU and UK leaders meet. Warm words abound, and a summit is scheduled for May.
Yet neither side has yet really moved on from past traumas to thinking through the new relationship. Ruthless pragmatism as stated by UK Minister Nick Thomas-Symonds isn’t a vision. Waiting for the other side, as the EU appears to suggest, similarly. Small steps forward are happening, but obviously missing are the leaders who are going to openly state that the EU and UK are stronger working together, and will make that happen.
Some have the simplistic take that it is solely UK red lines preventing this happening – but such positioning is normal in international relations. What lies behind is the real issue, in this case the fears and scarring all round that makes for only tentative steps forward as both sides are reluctant to make much of a positive case given it can so easily and carelessly be dismissed by the other.
Without such principles underpinning the UK-EU relationship some incoherence becomes inevitable. To take a Brussels example, early in the life of the new UK government it was warned reasonably not to link trade and security in some great bargain. Now the French allegedly want to prevent a security agreement unless it has reassurances on fish.
Similarly, the EU suggests that an SPS deal must be based on complete alignment but that if the UK was to offer a full alignment on all goods such as that modelled by Best for Britain this would be cherry picking. Meanwhile just suggesting limited SPS alignment to ease pressures under the Windsor Framework is poorly received.
That MEPs, Member States and the Commission repeat the same talking points on these subjects doesn’t make them a good basis for encouraging the UK to behave differently in creating a new partnership. Though it does offer clues as why the EU is a strong negotiator, and the UK that continues to repeat the lame “no running commentary” line is not.
Youth mobility illustrates problems on both sides, since the UK does not feel able to state the obvious that it already has such schemes. Meanwhile the EU has maximalist asks around NHS charges and foreign student fees that are extremely unlikely to happen and mostly suggest a lack of interest in better relations.
How difficult would it be to say that the two sides agree in principle that there will be a youth mobility scheme just as fish will inevitably be the subject of ongoing negotiations? Further, that once the principle is agreed, perhaps at the summit, that the detail can then be worked on in a way that creates a balance between both sides?
In reality, there are too many bad memories mostly unacknowledged for such smooth progress. Around the margins of the recent EU-UK Forum annual conference the most common analogy was of two divorcees learning to date again, to trust again, with friends on both sides mixed between those saying go for it and those urging caution.
That analogy is perhaps almost too revealing, because these divorcees are being asked to return to trusting the other party who in their view behaved extremely badly. Yes, the kids will do better and probably both sides happier if relations improve, but there’s always going to be the other to blame if that doesn’t happen.
This is where good intermediaries are rather more useful than passionate advocates who think there’s some simple answer. There are a few individuals around Brussels and London who are working assiduously to smooth issues, propose solutions and test their feasibility. Inevitably at times this irritates those who think they are the sole negotiators, but such ‘track two’ talks are always a part of modern negotiations, perhaps invaluably in this case.
Finding small identifiable steps that work for both UK and EU would seem to be the agenda for the moment, rather than thinking that everything can be fixed at once. Here there is progress. Energy has been added to the agenda through stakeholders declaring shared interests, not least to avoid Carbon Border Adjustment charges at the end of the year. UK membership of the Pan-Euro-Med convention on rules of origin also came on to the agenda thanks to the hard work of a few.
Smiles and small steps forward should be seen for what they are, confidence building measures short of fundamental change or the kind of positive economic impact both sides want to see. For that to happen, which may take some time, requires political courage on both sides to move beyond old arguments into new mutually beneficial arrangements. This will have to come at a time when President Trump is diverting most international attention onto dealing with his antics.
For the time being a security pact, even if it starts relatively shallow, and launching formal negotiations on energy would represent at least some deliverables from the summit due in May. There are more than enough topics which could be added, with deeper cooperation on economic security and regulation, and scoping negotiations on various issues including SPS, mobility, and fish, the obvious candidates.
UK officials mistaking the smiles for a changed EU attitude may think this unambitious, but those of us who follow negotiations for a living see more the difficulties. Brussels and London aren’t yet ready to propose ambitious ideas or hear them from the other side without fear of rejection. Then there is the difficulty of finding balanced packages which work for UK, EU and Member State sensitivities.
With both sides having similar asks of reduced trading frictions, greater mobility for some workers, security, and growth, there should be solutions available given time and effort. This though is beyond negotiators working out the details and compromises, and intermediaries facilitating discussions. On both sides it requires politicians to make the case to their own voters as to why this is important, deserves attention, and what needs to be offered to achieve results.
Most current political discussions on UK-EU relations tend to relitigate the past. That has to change before serious progress can be made.
