John Kampfner
[Pause] Right, good evening, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to this event. It’s actually my last event chairing for Chatham House, before I head back to Berlin and other parts. It’s been great fun doing all kinds of events here as part of the UK in the World project, which will go from strength to strength over the next year or two, and my colleague, David Lawrence, who’s somewhere, there he is, can give you more information about that any time.
We’ve got a great event this evening. I’m delighted that we are assembled here to talk about the B word, not for the first time in this institution, it won’t be for the last. It has come at yet another prescient important moment in the development we see with the Northern Ireland Protocol and many other things besides. The trigger, however, for this event is this excellent book by Stefaan De Rynck, who will present some thoughts on his book at the start of this evening’s event.
Stefaan was right at the right-hand of Michel Barnier during those negotiations and has many a story to tell, both in the detail, but also in the big picture. With him, we have Heather Grabbe from the Open Society, in – based in Brussels and Heather has also been following all matters European, was in the Commission some time before and is a great expert on the European side of the European debate, whilst also being no slouch on the British side of it, as well. And Lisa O’Carroll who has done great work as the Brexit Correspondent of The Guardian now through all the ups and downs of the process of the last several years.
Stefaan is going to give some introductory thoughts on – arising from his book. I’m then going to just ask him directly a few questions arising from that and specifically on his recollections of that time, so it’s a slight look back. Then, we’re going to open the conversation with Lisa and with Heather on the “Where are we now and where are we going to get to?” Stefaan, over to you. Oh, and sorry, before going any further, this is on the record, please do tweet away, #CHEvents. Thank you. Stefaan?
Stefaan De Rynck
Thank you, John. Tweet away, but know that I speak as an author of the book and not in any official way. I was here in December 17 actually. I don’t think I could have predicted what this book said. Robin Niblett and I had a conversation here in December 17, at the end of the first phase of negotiations. So, I just want to make three points by way of introduction that are at the heart of this book, which tells the story from the referendum, basically, until early 2021 until Christmas 2020, actually, when we concluded the Trade and Corporation Agreement with Boris Johnson and his government.
The three points by way of introduction. One point is, the unity of the European Union, which is at the heart of this book, I think, because this for me is the story of Brexit told from Brussels. It’s a very different story from Brexit here in the UK, I think, and that – but unity, I mean, unity between the 27 governments, but also between the other EU institutions, mainly, the European Commission and the European Parliament. And it’s not something we took for granted at the beginning of this – of these nego – of the story, actually, ‘cause the negotiations took 12 months to kick off after the referendum.
Chris Morris, I quote in the book, BBC 10 o’clock news, the day after the referendum, said, “This is the biggest crisis that the European Union faces.” It’s a crisis that dwarfs all the previous crises and my God, we had a few crises that divided the member states, on Brexit and the Euro and migration and the “Wir schaffen das” and all those kind of things that happened in 2015. I recall a number of conversations in the book, one – the first one between Barnier and the Taoiseach, Enda Kenny where it wasn’t clear yet who would – what the role of Michel Barnier would be. I quote one of the physical Prime Ministers, who said, “Well, maybe not all of my colleagues here will play that card of unity all the time.”
So, it was something that had to be constructed and also, I think, what played an important role in that is the restrictions we gave to David Cameron on the free movement of people played, still, a role after the referendum because, when we had the Cameron settlement, we immediately also added toward the European Council in case Vote Leave wins, all that is null and void. Expressing politically that fear, that if Vote Leave would win, we could be – put ourselves on a slippery slope which is kind of exceptional treatments.
And so, I explain the unity by focusing on a high degree and a high sense of political responsibility of European leaders, François Hollande at the time, Angela Merkel, German Chancellor, Rutte and all, Minister, President of the Netherlands and all these people, and strong Franco-German co-operation, partly born out of the Euro crisis, in my view, because it had been an existential challenge and the clear view was this could not become another existential challenge to the European Union. I speak about the Barnier method of transparency and inclusiveness and sharing all information from the Commission with the 27 governments.
The clarity of our mandate was incredibly important for us, the clarity of the negotiation mandate defined by European leaders and what that said about the autonomy of the EU not giving a voice to the UK, the integrity of the single market, and in my view and, also, what I write in the book, the UK’s approach which galvanised the unity at crucial moments. No deal threats which had no material impact on the EU, but made that unity even stronger I would say. And a rather odd way of negotiating, in the sense that telling the EU we were asking, or insisting, on the wrong things, that our mandate was perhaps the wrong one and that we would – we made the wrong choices.
We shouldn’t make the choice that leaving the single market and the Customs Union eliminates frictionless trade, which is what Theresa May said. That we should make the choice that any free trade agreement had to have level playing field commitments, which is what Boris Johnson had quoted on David Frost. But those were the choices EU leaders made and so, that was what we had to negotiate with.
So, I’ll be a bit briefer on my other two points. On negotiations, this may surprise some people, perhaps, in the room, given the image of Theresa May and Boris Johnson perhaps, but for me, I argue it was easier to negotiate with Boris Johnson than with Theresa May, for us, in Barnier’s team. And why? There are, of course, British political factors here, Johnson had a comfortable majority in 2020, which Theresa May did not have and so, the divided government of May and her – the divided party, Parliament, of course, didn’t make her task easier to negotiate and project the UK to – as a negoti – towards us.
But for me, and I looked at it from an EU perspective, and I said what was easier was that Boris Johnson and his government, and David Frost, his negotiator, his Cabinet Minister in 2020, accepted that leaving the single market and Customs Union inevitably led to obstacles to trade that didn’t exist before, which is what Theresa May did not want to accept. And that made it – he, kind of, sub – inscribed – subscribed to the paradigm, that was also our paradigm, the Canada versus Norway model at the time. Of course, that didn’t mean there were easy discussions with Boris Johnson, I’ll come back to that, but it made it easier than with Theresa May and secondly, Theresa May asked for a lot more than what Boris Johnson asked for. Some of it we were willing to give, common foreign and security policy and strategic partnership, which Boris Johnson no longer wanted and some of the issues that May asked, we couldn’t give because they were egregious of our mandate, basically.
The final point is that I often felt from British media and also, from British Government Ministers, a need to have a confrontational approach to these negotiations with the European Union. And I don’t think that was very helpful at all and I don’t think negotiations are about confrontation. There were metaphors of “We need to call Barnier’s bluff and see what cards he holds,” and he – “We all need to – let’s put our cards on the table,” within a poker game, one person wins the pot and the rest loses. In a negotiation, you need to – you both need to come out with something.
So, I never felt it was very helpful and I describe in 20 – the negotiations on the future relationship, six/seven months of confrontation, the UK telling us we shouldn’t ask for level playing field, we shouldn’t expect anything on fishery, and we couldn’t have a deal without those two issues. I, in the book, go back to October 16, the first conversation of Barnier with Mark Rutte, Dutch Prime Minister, where he said, “Level playing field is a deal-breaker. If there’s no level playing field, we were not going to do this. So, we have an open economy, we trade a lot, we need level playing field guarantees.”
And so, for me, in the book, I argue that at some point Theresa May had a much more engaging and co-operative approach, notably on the construction of her backstop. We can perhaps come back to another conversation, but for me, that’s still one of the biggest give and take moments of these negotiations. Where in this country some people, at least in Parliament, thought it was a trap set by the EU, from our perspective, it was something which we had to work very hard at member states to convince them that the backstop was something the EU could accept and we could do that because it came with stringent level playing field attached to it.
So, those are my points, basically, by way of introduction. I wrote this book because I wanted our story to be on the record, also, in English, on Brexit. It’s not a reckoning, for me it’s hopefully a catharsis, if we can live through this again and come to a better relationship going forward. So, thank you.
John Kampfner
Well, here’s to the catharsis. Thank you very much. Confrontational approach, failing to understand European Unioncy and then the relative strengths of weaknesses of Johnson and May’s negotiating position. You say in your conclusion, at the start of it, when you were scenario planning different outcomes in 2016, what resulted in 2020 was as close to the best-case scenario for the EU as you could have imagined. In other words, to put it another way, as some interlocutors in European countries have often said to me, “It was one thing to vote for Brexit and to have Brexit, it was quite another to arrive at the kind of Brexit that Britain arrived at.” Could you – do you, therefore, agree with the following proposition, that the British whole approach to the mechanics of Brexit, from the day after the referendum until now, will be studied in the future as a how to fail in negotiations? Could the Brits have, in purely practical, instrumental terms, have done any worse than they did?
Stefaan De Rynck
Well, speaking of catharsis, I think, on the first point, before I come across as a smug guy who predicted everything in October 16, in the team we have this scenario-planning and I think it was part of the strength of Barnier’s team and that we spent a lot of time and resources on things we never needed, worst-case scenarios, what happens if this, what happens if that? And I say, if you look at the end result, the financial settlement was satisfactory for us. We got, basically, everything we asked and what the member states wanted us to ask in this position. They were citizens’ rights. There were some minor concessions, with family reunion, but generally, we came out okay there. We have a deal for the future which has the level playing field. On fisheries it’s not ideal for us, but it’s still a transition period, goes from 100 to 75 over six years, so we have level playing field and nothing that damages the internal market and the autonomy of the EU.
So, in that sense, the outcome is satisfactory, but then my second paragraph starts by saying, how that outcome came about was entirely unexpected. And that comes to your point, and I guess could we have had a different outcome, basically, or – I think there were, certainly in Theresa May’s government, a number of Ministers who, at least, judged on the public statements, failed to understand fully the implications of leaving the single market and the Customs Union. ‘Cause people said, “Well, but we’ll still have access to the single market, we’ll still be trading, of course.” Yes, of course, but you won’t be a participant in that single market, and that’s a huge difference, as we can see now in the negative economic impacts, in terms of investment, and complexity for export to the EU and all the rest of it.
So, for me that, yeah, that was something that probably was not debated enough post-referendum here and “What does this mean now and what does this 52% leave mean? How do we go about it and what does it mean to leave the EU?” basically. The most Googled question apparently on the day after the referendum, right? So, I’m not sure if that’s true, but it’s what I’ve always read and – in British media. So, there could have been a different outcome. Theresa May’s deal was rejected in the House of Commons, to our despair, but okay, it happened and then we had the extensions, but that deal could have been agreed and then we had a political declaration for a much softer Brexit than what Boris Johnson wanted. But the House of Commons had made its choice there and the British voters ultimately gave Johnson the majority he needed to deliver the Brexit he wanted. So, it wasn’t just a referendum, it was even an election that – it was also an election that basically gave him the mandate to do what came out of this.
John Kampfner
Just before branching out, I’m just intrigued by your second point of the three that you made, that your assessment that Johnson and his negotiators were better negotiators than May is. But he agreed to customs’ checks in the Irish Sea without actually, according to you, realising what he was agreeing to.
Stefaan De Rynck
I didn’t say better, ‘cause – and I’m not making any judgments here, but I said it was easier for us to negotiate.
John Kampfner
Right, ‘cause Johnson didn’t do detail, so it was probably easier to…
Stefaan De Rynck
In the book, I say that he knew all the details of the Northern Irish and Irish protocol, in my view, judged on the conversations that I detail in the book with also Jean-Claude Juncker and others. So, I leave that for your consideration what you – what conclusion you draw from that, but I said it was easier to negotiate because Frost and Johnson accepted that leaving the single market led to friction in trade between us, between the UK and the EU. That made it easier, because we were kind of, part of the same paradigm.
On the famous Barnier staircase, there was the Canada model, they contested a level playing field and said, “We don’t want level playing field, we want an FTA only,” where that was – but it was within a framework where were understood that leaving the single market and Customs Union was something that would create friction in existing trade flows and diminish existing trade flows, as well. I think Johnson understood that and David Frost even said that publicly there would be a short-term adjustment cost to the Brexit, So, it’s not that they were – it’s more that we have the same paradigm, and now I lost track of your second point.
John Kampfner
It was just a provocation.
Stefaan De Rynck
Oh, okay.
John Kampfner
I’ll – we’ll come back to it. Lisa, I want to bring you in here with that point, that – or that assertion I made about the quality of British negotiation. You’ve been tracking this for some time, you’ve been tracking the protocol, you’ve been tracking the zig-zagging around. Could you give me your assessment? Let’s not talk about the principle of the decision of the referendum. Let’s take that as given. We’re starting with the vote to leave has taken place. What is your assessment, in broad terms, of how the Brits negotiated subsequent to that decision?
Lisa O’Carroll
I have to say, just listening to Stefaan, who would’ve come across lots during the last six, seven years, it’s like a nightmare, the backstop, the staircase. I’d forgotten about the staircase. And, you know, Barnier was in town yesterday promoting his book and it was, you know, a run through, again, of the last, you know – very traumatic experience.
On the negotiations, I mean, I’m not in the lobby, I’m not a Lobby Reporter, so I was generally reporting the impact outside it, what would have been a very frustrating, observation that I would make as a Reporter and a former Media Correspondent, was how Westminster focused the media, we’re here. I would be reporting for instance, on EU citizens and we had a little chat in the room before about the first draft offer that the EU made to roll over all the rights of EU citizens, i.e., “Just do a carve out, take EU citizens of this altogether. They didn’t – you know, they shouldn’t have – be impacted by this.” And there was a draft and there was a change in the draft and then there was a row within the EU as to whether they had made that offer at all. Anyway, Theresa May goes over to Brussels and makes a speech with the pack from Westminster. I just couldn’t believe the headlines, the – Theresa May had made a full and generous offer to EU citizens by restricting, basically, taking away some of the rights that they had. So, the EU had said, “Yes, you can have everything.”
So, I think the – a lot of the politics here is dominated by the optics within Britain and not the optics outside and certainly, when it comes to Northern Ireland, we can talk about that again, but I think the – you know, Northern Ireland was never really a full consideration of the full pack of people who are negotiating, certainly, in terms of the responsibility. You know, I think Lord Frost would have had a lot of power in that regard, but very little responsibility to the people in Northern Ireland, outside the Unionist tradition. So, yeah, i’’s really that the British was the, you know – the – confrontation was definitely part of the British tactic, and didn’t David Frost have this tactic of repeating some phrase in the negotiations with Barnier which he thought would really enrage Barnier and he’s feels like that actually worked?
John Kampfner
Sovereignty?
Lisa O’Carroll
I can’t remember what it was, but yeah – and so…
John Kampfner
So, if…
Stefaan De Rynck
As a way to reject any obligation, we were asking, whereas in negotiations, you give benefits in exchange for the other party accepting obligation. So…
John Kampfner
So, therefore, to extrapolate from what you said, the issue wasn’t necessarily the knowledge-base, the pragmatism, the skill of the negotiators. It was the fact that they were entirely…
Lisa O’Carroll
It’s politics. I mean, Olly Robinson [means Robbins], if you remember was Theresa May’s main person and Barnier said he was the most competent, you know, world-class Civil Servant that was involved and he was thoroughly disliked by the ultras in the Tory Party, as somebody who is betraying their interests. So, I think the Brexit that Britain got, you know, the fact that we’re talking about it now and it’s been talked about quite a lot in the past two weeks, is, I think, a reflection of the poor outcome for the country and the fact that we’re still talking about the Northern Ireland Protocol.
I mean, I remember, also at an event that we held in The Guardian with Jonathan Powell, who was laterally involved with The Good Friday Agreement and he said – you know, made the point, which a lot of people – well, it was pretty obvious, “The fact that Northern Ireland has been out of the headlines for the last 20 years is a good thing because it was always in the headlines for the wrong reason, with bombs for terrorism etc.” So, Brexit put it right back in there and I would question, as an Irish person here, you know, what kind of responsible Politician stoked all of the enmities up again? You know, so if you look at the societal impact, the business impact of Brexit, you’ve got to question whether – I mean, you know, whose interests, whose ideological interests? Those political interests, that was party negotiating with itself rather than negotiating via the country, that’s what I’d argue.
John Kampfner
So, before we come to the present and the future and with specific reference to Northern Ireland, among other things, Heather, just to finish off this section on the history, Lisa was talking about the optics of Westminster. Could you outline for us your view, with reference to Stefaan’s observations, the optics from Brussels? What were the Brits not getting, or what were they getting?
Dr Heather Grabbe
Well, I saw it from civil society in Brussels, working for a – the Open Society European Policy Institute, and from the perspective of somebody who was working with the people who negotiate countries joining the EU enlargement. So, I’d worked on enlargement for many years here at Chatham House, then in the Commission in the Cabinet of the Enlargement Commissioner and then afterwards, at Open Society. And there were some very blindingly obvious things about the way the EU negotiates that everybody in Brussels knew, because it’s always there in the enlargement negotiations.
It’s a rules-based system, where any deviation from the rules damages the interests of those who abide by the rules. So, any deviation from the rules is always going to be extremely controversial, with at least some of the other member states, which is why in enlargement negotiations, usually the Commission starts with the country that wants to join by saying, “You do realise that 90% of the – a key of the whole rules-based system is non-negotiable, because any deal we do with you that’s bespoke, that’s special, is going to wreck the interests of those who negotiated all of these rules among themselves in the past.”
And, of course with the UK, the UK had, itself, negotiated those rules as a member. And I remember, some people saying, “Ah, so why did we give in on this piece of legislation, or that rule to the UK under Major or under Blair and now they’re leaving and we could have done it differently?” So, there was a little bit of, “Ooh, how do you unscramble the British egg from the omelette?” because the EU had been so much – the EU’s rules system had been so much shaped by the UK over the course of membership and I think we can see a little bit, just fast-forwarding slightly, the debate we’re now having about green industrial policy. The Swedes and the Dutch are going, “Where’s the UK? If only the UK were here, we’d be able to switch off the state aids tap again.”
So, this – there was a sense of this fundamentally rocks the politics in – among the member states on this rules-based framework that the UK had been part of, because it will alter the political balance. But there was no expectation I think – I remember in 2016/17/18, initially, the view was, “Okay, this is going to be – you know, this is very sad that this is happening, but it’s going to be, you know, a perfectly normal negotiation.” The degree of political salience that it acquired in the UK and particularly the issue of Northern Ireland, that caused real amazement that – how – why is London doing this? Why is the government doing this when, you know, you – there had been this commitment to The Good Friday Agreement?
And I think issue that Lisa was just talking about, this sense of, among the 27, there was – there were two very strong points of unity about interests on anything to do with the deal. One was, the Commission has to be in charge of negotiations, and I think that was completely underestimated by Westminster because the Commission always is. In enlargement negotiations, in trade negotiations, it’s a community competence, it’s always the Commission in charge. You can’t do bilateral deals, ‘cause again, that will upset the whole system.
And the other thing was, you have to defend member states’ interests and Ireland remains a member state. So, anything that goes against the interests of Ireland as a country is going to – you know, the Commission is duty-bound to protect it. But there was a kind of understanding that, yes, but of course, Britain will want to do its best for the people of Northern Ireland and actually, surely that’s not very different from the interests of the people of Ireland, our member state. And there was this bafflement about why is London taking this approach, which is clearly – is not only antagonistic, but where Ireland is desperate for a deal that works for the people of Northern Ireland too? So, this definition of interests on the UK, in London in particular, was really quite confusing.
John Kampfner
But that doesn’t speak to the politics as much, surely, as to the other potential reason, which was a lack of professionalism, just in terms of the art of negotiation. If you don’t know how your opponent, or the other side, negotiates and you don’t know the parameters, that’s fairly fundamental to any jurisdiction in negotiations.
Dr Heather Grabbe
And that was the big question because, of course, there are lots of British Diplomats and Civil Servants who know the EU inside out. But we – I mean, you could see them slowly being rooted out of important positions. You know, Olly Robins was there with Theresa May, as you pointed out. There is – but very often you saw how Number 10 was overriding those views and not welcoming those views. I mean, that’s just something I observed from outside, I was not involved in any way, but there were – but I do – I remember hearing officials saying, “But hang on, where are these people we know really well who are in the Civil Service, who’ve been even permanent representatives of the UK in Brussels? Why are they not involved? Who’s informing the Prime Minister? Why is the Prime Minister so badly briefed on this?”
And this rhetoric about, “The EU is being beastly to Britain,” I heard that quite often, was also, I think, a misunderstanding of the way the EU works, that actually punishing a country for leaving, yeah, nobody wants to make it attractive to leave, but punishing a very big trade partner, and a country that’s really important for foreign security policy, defence, we can come on to that, was never really seen as a fundamental interest, I don’t think. I really never heard anybody saying – I mean, I certainly – the change of political dynamic, it makes France more important, makes Germany, to an extent, more important, the fact that a country of Britain’s size and economic weight left. But the – there was always this sense of, “This is just a net loss for everybody.”
John Kampfner
Yeah, so, we – the subject of this conversation is, “Then, Now and the Future of Brexit.” We’ve done a fair amount of ‘then’. Let’s just go briefly onto the ‘now’ and specific reference to Northern Ireland and the negotiations. Then I want, there’s a couple of points about the ‘future’ I want to ask before we throw it open to questions to the audience both here and online. Stefaan, just from a negotiator’s point of view, could you just outline for us as succinctly as possible what – where you see the negotiations as they currently stand, so, not in a political reference, but in a more processed reference? What happens now?
Stefaan De Rynck
Yeah, you’re putting me in slightly a difficult position, as I have a mandate to speak as author of the book, so I cannot speak for today, except for echoing what President von der Leyen said yesterday, I believe, where “We’re working together.” She has an excellent relationship with Rishi Sunak, she said, on many things they discussed, also the protocol and we’re looking at a package and, hopefully, find solutions together. But I think if I bring it back to the book, we had negotiated two different options with two different Prime Ministers, with Theresa May and with Boris Johnson. I think that shows the degree of flexibility that the EU has shown in the past to make this work, with that one bottom line, which is single market integrity, so we need to find ways to make that work and, of course, protect The Good Friday Agreement, as I mentioned. What is happening today I really can’t – I’m not at liberty to talk about and also not involved any longer in those talks.
John Kampfner
Do you detect – I know again, this post-dates the book, but do you detect, again, in instrumental terms, the approach of the Sunak government being different or largely along the same lines?
Stefaan De Rynck
The situation is different. I can’t, again, assess government this or that, but I think if you look at what I describe in the book, a number of factors that have negatively shaped the story that is in the book, are no longer there today and part of that – factors are will Brexit actually happen? That was a huge factor during the period of the book, that affected British politics and Westminster and Parliament and will there be a, perhaps, a second referendum? And is the EU perhaps trying to keep us close for the second referendum, which was neither here nor there? It’s totally ludicrous, I think, in terms of allegation, but it was nevertheless one that some MPs took seriously and shaped the way they perceived the reality and their political positioning. So, that’s gone. The idea that Barnier, perhaps, or the EU, would sabotage Brexit is also gone, and the idea that, or the risk, at least, of a no-deal cliff edge is also gone and that was also a factor that has often negatively shaped the negotiations, I think, at that time. So, the conditions are different today, but I can’t really talk about today’s talks.
John Kampfner
So, Lisa, you’re going to tell us what’s going to happen?
Lisa O’Carroll
Well, just – I suppose it would be – it’s interesting just to state again the obvious of the difference between where we are now and where we were this time last year. So, this time last year, David Frost had gone, Liz Truss had been appointed, I think she met Maroš Šefčovič twice before the outbreak of war and then it just deteriorated. It went off a cliff edge with the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill tabled, I think, in June. And then, extraordinarily, when she became Prime Minister in September, talks were revitalised and I think since then, with Sunak in position, what we have seen is a well overdue, re-establishment of our – an attempt to re-establish a working relationship with the EU, which will, you know, determine the future relationship which everyone thinks has been – you know, the relationship was deeply damaged.
And the Anglo-Irish relations have really been repaired at a very quick rate, with, I think, an intensity of relations with two ERG former leaders, European Research Group, Chris Heaton-Harris and Steve Baker Institute in Northern Ireland and you know, there was probably the biggest ministerial visit to Dublin, as part of one of the British-Irish intergovernmental conference meetings two weeks ago and I mean, that itself was extraordinary. I remember speaking to somebody on the Foreign Affairs team in Ireland not so long ago saying, “Isn’t it interesting that such and such is going to Northern Ireland?” like maybe it was Chris Heaton-Harris, and he said “The fact you say that, Lisa, the fact you think that that is good shows you how much – how badly damaged the – Boris – you know, the relationship was damaged under Boris Johnson.”
John Kampfner
But on the specifics now of the potentially final stages…
Lisa O’Carroll
Yeah, sorry.
John Kampfner
…of the Protocol Bill…
Lisa O’Carroll
Yeah, so…
John Kampfner
…in – Sunak has to marry, surely, the political domestic concerns of the ERG, DUP and others, with his need to get onto a better footing with Biden and with Macron and with Scholz and with von der Leyen. Which will win out and how – and just…?
Lisa O’Carroll
So, he doesn’t want a trade war, which is the ultimate consequence of not doing a deal on the protocol. We saw in The Times yesterday a report that was played down by both London and the EU, but I’m sure there were elements of it that were on the right track, that they are close to a deal. But the question is, what kind of deal? And I don’t see that the compromises are going to be big enough at all to deal with the DUP seven tests, so I don’t think he will get the DUP on board. That he does face this question of will he face down the ERG and the DUP?
John Kampfner
And do you think he – I mean, do you think what is negotiable, what is left, given that it won’t be accepted by the DUP, that’s – and possibly by some elements of the ERG, do you think Sunak has the political strength and determination to sign it and if he doesn’t, then what happens?
Lisa O’Carroll
Well, if he doesn’t, then the EU go back to what their position was, which was then reactivate all those legal proceedings and ultimately, you get a trade war, so, he can’t afford that. The economy can’t afford that. Look at the figures that were out today. And, you know, the Tories, there’s this other cliff edge, so the cliff edge of a deal, no-deal is not there, but the election next year, whether it’s May or October, you know, there is a question of, are the Tories going to be in power again? So, does he say to his opponents in the ERG, “Take this, because this is the closest thing you’ll get to the hard Brexit that you wanted. It’s not perfect, but it’s fair, or you go with Keir Starmer’s version of Brexit,” which, you know, they will – you know, you saw Daniel Hannan the other day, one of the architects of the Leave Campaign, in the Telegraph, talking about the “re-join by stealth.” So, you know, they’re already lining up these very emotional arguments about what the Labour Party are going to do. They’re going to soften Brexit to a point where it’s almost re-joining. And so, you know, that’s his dilemma. I mean, I think he doesn’t have much of a choice but to go with the deal and the protocol.
John Kampfner
That’s very clear, thank you. Heather, on the future and you’ve just teed it – Lisa’s just teed it up very well by talking about the General Election. Let’s assume, by just simply following the opinion polls, that Starmer wins, either with a tiny or a negligible majority or something more substantial, it is surely axiomatic that, obviously, they’ll be a re-statement of not seeking to re-join the EU, or leaving aside what the EU wants of us, which is not clamouring for it, but also not seeking to re-join, in any way, the Customs Union or the single market. Let’s rule them all out for the foreseeable future in British political terms. What, therefore, if you were advising a British Prime Minister, what are the mechanisms for improving relations with the European Union? How can Britain become a close partner of the EU again? Let’s leave Ukraine and the security side of things to one side. What is the most Britain can achieve in those five years, short of re-joining any of the fundamental mechanisms?
Dr Heather Grabbe
Well, actually, I think Ukraine and foreign security policy is an important way of simply getting back to common interests and, obviously, the UK is working with the European allies through NATO very actively and very well, but just getting a sense of, what do we all want in the world? What does Britain and the 27 EU member states want in the world? That alignment of interest, fundamental alignment of interests, when you’ve got, you know, US-China rivalry, massive challenges that are facing everybody, from re-alignment of power politics and also, you know, the entry of new powers into the global scene, but also climate, of course, and these other global challenges. Just getting a sense of we’re actually on the same side, that the fundamental interests are the same, is actually very significant. And I think that’s where Ukraine has, the – not Ukraine, but the war, horrible situation though it is, actually helps to remind everybody about these fundamentals that Russia is the fundamental problem on the European continent and there’s a strong alignment.
But what’s tricky, I think, is about the economic policy choices, because the idea of Singapore-upon-Thames, which was always a fantasy in various ways, ‘cause of course, Singapore is not a completely free, you know, free market country, in any case, but this idea of having competitive deregulation as a significant advantage for Britain outside the single market, that’s the big question. Would the UK do that? And it hasn’t really happened, to a large extent, yet. I mean, here we are, in 2023, it’s been quite a few years now. We haven’t seen a bonfire of the regulations. We have seen now significant debate in the UK about what happens to environmental regulation and so on. And meanwhile, on the EU side, there’s been a massive change since 2017, which is the European Green Deal, that we now have the mainstreaming of climate and, essentially, a transition to climate neutrality through a huge range of EU policies and now the start of both the US and the EU entering an era of green industrial policy which looks quite different from the policy debates of the past.
So, at the moment, it’s all about state aids and funding for innovation and technological development and so on, but it’s also about setting the global norms for a low carbon, climate neutral economy in the future, where the EU is the rule-maker, because the US has the money, but the EU has the regulatory power. And so, in that, where there’s going to be a lot of EU-US co-operation, that’s already happening, let’s see what happens after the next US election, but where does Britain stand on all of that? If you’ve got the US and the EU now aiming to shift their economies, not only on energy, but on a huge range of other things, fast with a lot of public money, with a strong state, much more state intervention than there’s been for the past 30 years, what is the UK’s position going to be? What’s the UK – what does it want for its own economy? What kinds of global rules and norms and standards does it want? Does it wish to talk to the EU about that? And especially if there’s an EU-US deal.
So, we’re entering a different era, where the idea of Singapore-upon-Thames just looks really quite irrelevant, even if it had already started, which it hasn’t. So, I think this question of, what would a Labour Government’s economic policy choices be and how would it integrate climate and energy objectives into that, that will be fundamental for the relationship.
John Kampfner
Thank you. there’s a lot of questions online, so I assume that is replicated by questions in the hall. We’ve got a few here. Let’s start with a lady right here in the front and we’ll go to there, third row, thank you. And then we’ll take some from – we’ll take those two together.
Member
I’m so sorry, this is a very obvious question and ruling back in, John, what you just ruled out, but what do the panellists think are the odds of the UK ever re-joining and if it is a possibility, when and on what terms?
John Kampfner
Right, yeah.
John Bead
Straight for another question. Hello John, yeah, hello Stefaan, I’m John Bead. The – I’m very interested in your point that it was in some ways easier negotiating with a Johnson team because they accepted that trade friction would happen. But the one thing that seemed to me to distinguish the Johnson team from the May team was the lack of trust, that you could trust May, but you couldn’t really trust Johnson. And, in particular, that seems to me to have applied to the Northern Ireland situation, because it – both Johnson and Cummings repeatedly said, “Don’t worry, there aren’t going to be any border controls. If you’re sent any forms, just tear them up, throw them in the bin. None of that’s never going to happen.” And there was a huge chunk of the Tory Party, and there still is, who think that the whole thing was unnecessary. You know, we could have had some magic solution, “We could have had alternative arrangements, we could have had trusted traders, you didn’t need a border in either the Irish Sea or between North and South,” and they still say that.
So, I just wonder, do you think now, this question actually also is asked of Michel yesterday, do you think that Boris and his team ever intended to apply the Northern Ireland Protocol as they negotiated, first with the Varadkar and then in Brussels, or did they actually not intend to apply it at all?
John Kampfner
Right, that one’s directed at you, so that one, that one you do and I’m not sure you’ll be able to answer the Britain re-joining, so I’ll ask that of Lisa and Heather.
Stefaan De Rynck
Well, I’ll say a few points, okay, on – well, it’s not my point – my place to speak about re-joining, that’s a UK debate. But the EU is evolving, as Heather just said, right, so now we have £800 billion borrowing capacity and that will affect, no doubt, discussions in the budget in the future and the next budgeting period. We used a peace facility to fund member states delivery of weapons to Ukraine. So, the EU countries are joining the Euro, countries want to join Schengen. The EU is changing and so that’s something to keep in mind in that discussion that may or not take place here.
On John’s question, well, now you will compare Michel Barnier’s answer with mine and compare notes, maybe, so let’s see. I’m not sure what he said, but I will say, what’s in the book and I will leave the details for you to read, but it’s – the book is – that’s an amazing ten days of negotiations. The discrepancy between what was said to Westminster media and what UK negotiators told at the same time in London, in Brussels, was absolutely amazing, I thought, absolutely flabbergasted by how that worked. At the moment when…
Dr Heather Grabbe
For example.
Stefaan De Rynck
At – for example. At the moment when someone in Downing Street leaked a WhatsApp message, it was then replicated in The Spectator about it all going haywire, at that same day, we made very good progress on some key technical issues in Brussels. So, I’m not sure, was that for domestic purposes or not? Well, there is the famous video in Belfast of Boris Johnson and the Customs Declarations, where the negotiations on that finish with the Juncker phone call where it was very clear that those declarations were part of the deal and so, Juncker rejected the request for the [audio cuts out – 47:57] – but by Boris Johnson on that.
So, perhaps some people thought they would change this later on in the future relationship, or in different ways. I document in the book how all these no-deal threats and then the threat of violating the existing withdrawal agreement in September 2020, in the midst of negotiations on the future, had no material impact whatsoever on our position on the future, but my reading is that that that was done to put pressure on the EU to try to divide the EU to give in on the future relationship, to put us in a, kind of, a pressure cooker on level playing field and water down whatever we were asking, which basically didn’t work because we kept these two workstreams separate, immediately. Infringement on the withdrawal agreement back then in 2020, and we continued negotiating constructively on our side on the future. So, well, that’s somewhat of an answer to your question.
John Kampfner
Lisa, on the re-joining?
Lisa O’Carroll
Directly, what was the question? Do you think…?
John Kampfner
Can you envisage…?
Lisa O’Carroll
…there is a chance, or what – very, very low. At some point, of course, there’s, you know – but I don’t – I think the last six/seven years have been so traumatic for the country that I cannot see, you know, even with buyer’s remorse on big – you know, an element of buyer’s remorse on some leave, or on the remain side, I cannot see another referendum. I mean, you look at Northern Ireland and you go, you know, the discussion about a border poll, it is so, so complicated, do you want to visit that on the country again? I think it’s a generation away.
John Kampfner
And let me just develop that and give you the opportunity to answer the question that I directed previously at Heather. Assuming that doesn’t – in – we’re talking the next – my frame of reference is the next five to seven years, so we’re talking about if Starmer were elected in his first term. Given that he will rule it out and the other mechanisms as well, what – and I know you’re not in the lobby, but you know, you talk to the people relevant to that discussion, how – what do you think he wants beyond the, “I want to have better relations,” which Sunak says as well? What do you think he wants? How do you think he defines a better relationship with the European Union?
John Kampfner
Well, he wants…
John Kampfner
Or a closer relationship.
John Kampfner
His speech last year dealing with the five point – you know, they would look to obviously the trade agreement is up for re-negotiation next – in 2025. Interestingly, the protocol, there’s a vote on the protocol in Stormont next year, if Stormont exists next year. He will seek to look for alignment in the fishery agreement, a mutual qualification of, except some qualifications…
John Kampfner
But that’s all low-hanging fruit.
Lisa O’Carroll
It is, but there is also the point made at the Barnier event yesterday that, you know, the Labour Party and even in – we – The Guardian has a – did a podcast yesterday and the – you know, there was talk about – you know, that would still – there would still be cherry-picking. You know, the Labour Party will still find itself in the same situation, there are a lot of things that they’ll be looking for that come with the four freedoms and single market that they won’t have. So, my guess is that the Labour Party’s dilemma right now is, they – you know, they will disappoint Labour supporters who want to re-join, but those Labour supporters are not going to turn into Tory supporters, because he’s not going to look to re-join. And that they will come up with some language that will give him some wriggle room, you know, some language in the manifesto that will give him some wriggle room in the first, or possibly the second Parliament, they will be looking for. Presumably they will, you know – what they are hoping for is a, you know, a decisive victory in 2024, rather than a narrow majority, that will give him the chance of two terms rather than one.
John Kampfner
Let’s take some more questions here and then go – oh gosh, sorry, the gentleman here has been patient and then, right at the front. And then I’ll just take a couple of quick more and please make your questions incredibly short, because I also want to go online.
Member
I think there’s a widespread view that the hard Brexit was damaging to the British economy. Am I right in thinking the hard Brexit was advantageous to the rest of the EU, partly because it knocked back London’s position in professional services in such a big way and finance and secondly, because inward investment, industrial investment, clearly would’ve subtracted away from London, away from the UK, to the larger market on the continent? So, if I’m right in assuming it was advantageous, the hard Brexit was advantageous, why would the EU want to negotiate with Keir Starmer a, well, a softer Brexit?
John Kampfner
And let’s just pass it straight to the gentleman in front, thank you. No, just there. Thank you.
Member
…Porter, private member. My question is about the Labour Party, definitely. For six years, and up until a few months ago, they were very strongly advocating a return to the single market and the Customs Union. Lisa said that they – the Labour voters would not turn to the Tories. She’s absolutely right, but I voted, although I didn’t…
John Kampfner
Will you keep it very tight, please.
Member
Sorry, yeah.
John Kampfner
I want to get some more questions in. What’s the question?
Member
The question is, will the southern pro-EU Labour voters not feel like I feel, very betrayed by the sudden change in Labour policy?
John Kampfner
Right, thank you. Right at the back there, please, thank you, and the very persistent gentleman there with his hand up, in the white.
John Mason
John Mason, a Chatham House member. Do you think Brexit made Ukraine more likely, or in the form that Ukraine has happened? Is there any effect of Brexit now?
John Kampfner
That’s the [inaudible – 54:16], right, yeah?
Euan Grant
Yeah, following on from the previous gentleman, the comments you’ve made – the name’s Euan Grant, I’m a former Law Enforcement Intelligence Analyst who’s worked on EU assistance programmes in Ukraine. They were not the Entebbe Raid of artificial…
John Kampfner
Sorry, could I just ask you…
Euan Grant
…assistance.
John Kampfner
I’m looking for a question, please.
Euan Grant
My question is…
John Kampfner
Thank you.
Euan Grant
…how deep and longstanding is the central Brussels commitment, Ukraine on defence and security and therefore, back to the point you made about working closely with Britain alone and onwards to the US? How deep and sustained is it or is it faintly?
John Kampfner
Let’s take one more and then go online. Right here in the front.
Member
Very short, will the EU accept UK if they apply to join, re-join?
John Kampfner
Right, okay, right. There’s lots there, Stefaan, how Brexit was good for Europe. I won’t ask you about Labour voters, I’ll ask you about Guy Verhofstadt’s remarks and anything else.
Stefaan De Rynck
I represent European Commission in Belgium now and there was a report last week on inward investment into the Flemish economy, which showed that part of it was raised to Brexit. So, the Flemish economy has gained last year in terms of inward investment because of Brexit, and part of it is British companies opening an establishment, or second establishment, part of it is British companies opening distribution centres, or warehouses or services, indeed, as you mentioned. I wouldn’t go as far to say we have benefited because it’s still a lose-lose situation and there have been costs made by export, food exporters and others in terms of adjusting to the new situation, so the overall picture is not positive. It inflicted damage on both of us, I think. More on the UK, obviously. That’s on my point, also, on the future.
For sure, we need to work on a more constructive relationship, a more positive relationship in the future, but I still follow the debate quite closely here and I sometimes get the impression that people think that the EU will be there to help mitigate the cost of Brexit in the UK and that’s not our role. I mean, our role is to defend the interests of the EU, as you alluded to, also, in your question and so, the EU will act in its own interests. And it is in our interest to have a more constructive and close relationship, but not to the point where the EU would step in to help compensate for the inevitable negative cost of Brexit that has been imposed on this country.
John Kampfner
Heather, any of the questions that arose?
Dr Heather Grabbe
Yeah, well, I think there is no option to just join the single market anymore. This has gone, I mean, Brexit’s happened. There is no soft Brexit to negotiate now. And the EU has historically accepted, you know, as it says in Article 49 of the Treaty, any country which is on the European Continent which is considered geographically European can join – can apply, can apply to join. But of course, as time goes on, it becomes harder to join because the EU evolves, it starts, you know, developing new policies, new institutions, new things to do and the divergence of regulation and rules and everything else gets bigger and therefore, the costs of joining, the costs of adjustment go up. So, that’s the tricky part. I think, actually, it would be considered a total coup diplomatically for the UK to apply, but it’s not something that would then bring joy in terms of the toughness of the negotiations. It would be like any other country applying, including Ukraine. That’s why it will take a long time for Ukraine to go through this process, too.
There is, maybe, if one were to enter speculation, the idea of having a Customs Union, especially with the UK. You know, the EU does have one with Turkey. But, you know, that was signed at a time when tariff barriers were the big issue and these days, it’s so much about non-tariff barriers, norms and standards and the like, and of course, trade is now becoming a key instrument for decarbonisation. So, as the EU moves towards CBAM, the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, and other trade measures for moving to a green economy, it could actually become more and more advantageous to the UK to think about what kind of deal to negotiate on trade. So, I think that I would bring in, the idea of having some kind of trade and customs set of arrangements, and of course, the Northern Ireland question then becomes a very big part of that. But the single market on its own is not on the table for anybody.
And just on Ukraine, it’s not really about the – Brussels’ commitment to Ukraine, it’s all about the member states. And there, I mean, I – from what I see, the member states of the EU are largely very committed, still. This can fragment over time as public opinion changes and there are some member states which are less keen on it than others. And there have been very public rows and debates about this. But I think the issue about Ukraine is that it focuses minds. It gets everybody to think about, okay, there – real trouble is back. We’ve had 30 years of a very nice, you know, post-1989 world of lot of prosperity and trade and so on. We’re now back to hard security questions where countries have to pull together and I think that’s where the UK being a, you know, a very important ally in NATO and being significant contributor to European security as a whole, it act – that increases the salience of the UK.
John Kampfner
Which brings – I mean, on – and Lisa, I’ll come on here, there’s one question online. Most of the online questions, very good that they are, are variations of the themes that we’ve been discussing here in the hall. But roughly spoken, this one says, “Has the phenomenon of Brexit ultimately shaped the character of Europe internationally?” which brings also to the Guy Verhofstadt quote that he was criticised for, basically, saying, “Brexit emboldened Putin.” I suppose, if you slightly rephrased what he said and said, would Putin have been – could you understand Putin thinking, when you looked at 2016, not just Brexit, but Trump and many of the other things, Orbán and others were thinking that Europe was not what it was and was easily rolled over, and Europe has proven him wrong, or maybe it hasn’t. So, maybe on these concluding thoughts, Lisa, where do you think Brexit has – it’s probably the wrong way of looking at it in terms of the wrong end of the microscope, but where has Brexit left Europe? How as Brexit affected Europe? Did it galvanise Europe to be more cohesive and harmonious?
Lisa O’Carroll
I’m probably not the best person to answer that and I did want to make a point about where I think the Northern Ireland Protocol thing had gone wrong, if I could…
John Kampfner
Sure.
Lisa O’Carroll
…first. But you know, you could argue to that point – to that question, that the EU has actually, has used Brexit, has learnt some lessons from Brexit and has changed its approach to, you know, the likes of Orbán and that, you know, the Ukraine has created this incredibly united bloc and united, indeed, with the UK and the rest of the world, and there’s a much, much bigger picture here. It’s the West versus Putin and it’s also China and what happens in China and what happens when COVID disappears in China and, you know, you’re then into another sort of economic situation with – you know, with demand of energy going through the roof, potentially throwing Europe into another, you know, cost of living crisis in 2024, you know. I know there’s some European leaders who worries that 2024 might be worse than 2023, so, yeah.
Dr Heather Grabbe
I think it’s had two big effects on the EU itself. One is, it simply tipped the balance away from the economic liberals. I was mentioning earlier, the Swedes and the Dutch are finding it harder now because they always had Britain on that side of the able. So, more of – you see more of social market economy arguments and an arguments for state intervention. So, that’s one way.
But the other way is, I think it is really significant that the UK was, for decades, known as the awkward partner, the one who, you know, at the table, in the Council, would make a fuss and argue its point and want to change things and ask for opt-outs and so on. But in the end, the UK, once the deal was done would go home and British Ministers would implement it. And I think that’s partly how the loss of trust and the shock at, “Wait a minute, we agreed one thing and now they’ve gone and done something else,” was – that was a big difference with the Brexit negotiations. But also, this is not how some of the member states, most notably the Fidesz Government in Budapest is behaving now, that they’re not necessarily implementing what was agreed at the table and that’s why we’ve ended up now with new conditionality for members inside the Union on rule of law and on – there are all kinds of problems now with trying to maintain common positions in foreign policy, as well.
So, that has – that’s a real change for the worse. Maybe the UK could’ve helped to stop that undermining of the EU, but I think, more fundamentally, it’s about the kind of organisational culture, that the UK there, as one of the large member states with this notion of sincere co-operation and that once you’ve done a deal, pacta sunt servanda, you argue in the room, but once you’re out of the room you implement. That’s something that’s now been undermined in a way and perhaps the UK could have helped to avoid it.
Stefaan De Rynck
Could I just…?
John Kampfner
Yeah, various people asked for more questions.
Stefaan De Rynck
Yeah, two or three things on this bigger point. If you look at 2016-23, there’s a lot more EU unity than the same period before 2016 and that made Ukraine, Brexit, that’s first point. Second point on economic liberals, I think there’s a bigger picture here as well, that the pendulum of history has swung towards the state. More defence spending, pandemic, helping businesses, public finances, it’s a totally different world out there, as well. But it’s not just the old state aid, kind of, issue. There’s a – and clean tech, we need to accelerate, so it’s a whole different thing and, of course, the EU will take, for me, decisions which will shape the continent on all these things and there the UK has lost its political influence, basically. It’s still an important NATO partner, it’s still – it’s an important NATO partner, it works with member states, EU and non-EU on Ukraine and NATO, bilaterally it works a lot. But there in terms of important decisions for European Continent taken by the EU, it no longer has a voice.
John Kampfner
So, final short question to all of you and short answers, ‘cause we’re coming up against time is this. So, the EU that Britain negotiated with and subsequently left, was then. The EU that Britain will be dealing with in the future, leaving aside whether – how close it gets to it, is looking very different, isn’t it? And we haven’t even discussed the possibility of Ukraine – what happens to Ukraine’s application to join? So, just take Britain out of the picture for a second if you would and start with you, Heather, what do you think the EU is becoming and what will it look like? I mean, obviously, if Ukraine joins, the entire geostrategy, the whole – entire geography of the place fundamentally changes and is that EU going to be more manageable, less manageable? How – and in terms of the relation – how Britain should look at it, how different do you think it will be?
Dr Heather Grabbe
Well, Ukraine’s path to membership even if the war ended tomorrow, which would be a wonderful thing, will be long, because it’s just very complicated joining this very rules-bound club. So, you know, it’s very rare to be able to do negotiations quickly and when you’re trying to reconstruct after a war, you know, it’ll take many years, in any case. But, I think, more fundamentally, the series of crises that Stefaan was just referring to, that have happened, COVID, the war, the – you know, the growing sense of urgency of the climate crisis, this has necessitated collective action. It has given the EU level more powers, often, kind of, cobbled together in a bricolage kind of way, for example on funding, as the EU has sought to reform itself without changing its treaties. But it’s meant that there has been a lot more focus on taking decisions together and implementing them really fast, and the EU wasn’t really designed for this.
You know, it’s like trying to fit wings to a tank and a jet engine and then expecting it to fly. It’s fundamentally a land, slow-moving land vehicle, okay? And so, this retrofit isn’t working terribly well and that’s why it often seems ridiculously slow and so on. And yet, it’s delivered the goods. In terms of output legitimacy, the EU did manage to get together the vaccines, the EU has managed to get together the funding and including even a debt instrument, for the first time. It has actually done a lot, actually, on Ukraine, its defence and industrial side, but more particularly on sanctions, really holding together on sanctions, that’s been really vital.
And so, actually, the crises have shaped the EU much more than Brexit has and I think the sadness that you hear, and it really is sorrow and sadness that you hear much more of in Brussels, it’s like, sort of, Britain’s referred to as this, kind of, self-harming cousin that has chosen to go and live in this really awful place all by itself and “Isn’t that really sad, ‘cause, you know, we actually quite liked them before?” That’s the sort of feeling of it. It’s not at all a sense of revenge, it’s just like, “Well, why are they doing this to themselves?” But where Britain is really missed is on this idea of, “Hey, listen, we’ve really got to pull together because these crises are huge and there’s going to be more of them.” And so, having more weight in the Union matters and that’s where I think the idea of Britain re-joining it in some future is still – there’s a lot of attraction to that. It’s just practically it would be extremely difficult now, for all the reasons Lisa was saying domestically, as well.
John Kampfner
Yeah, Lisa, a couple from you?
Lisa O’Carroll
I’ll just tie it into the Northern Ireland, but where I think it went wrong…
John Kampfner
Yeah.
Lisa O’Carroll
…because there are parallels. So, I think with Northern Ireland one of the things that was really very obvious when the protocol came into force was that there was no implementation body, there was no holding, there was no mothering of the protocol. We had shortages on the shelves, etc., and it hasn’t improved. And the problem is that the local parties, the local leaders, were given no agency in the protocol. It’s all Brussels and London. And, in a way, I think we need to learn the lesson, or the UK and EU need to learn the lesson from that, is the implementation bodies that were sent up under the withdrawal agreement, where are they, what are they doing? Are they public facing? No. They publish minutes, they don’t – you know, there’s no discussions, no political investment put into those, you know, East-West institutions, which are parallel to the East-West institutions created by The Good Friday Agreement. And I think that is a question that is being posed, is, “How does the UK infiltrate its way back into EU structures?” Through, you know, informal meetings, like the – we had the Macron EPC, the European Political Community, the – well, people thought will fit that.
And I think to go to your original question is, you know, the EU in five, seven, ten years’ time will be very different. Look, we’ve got Finland and Sweden, you know, the question about them joining NATO, that’s going to change the balance of, you know, the geopolitics of Eastern Europe. It’s going to change North Eastern Europe isn’t it? And, who knows, you know, of the outcome of the war and what impact that will have and how long that’s going to go.
John Kampfner
And also your point about Northern Ireland, disenfranchised Northern Ireland in perpetuity or in the medium term, if a deal is struck and the DUP don’t play and then, Northern Ireland has no government, we’re in very dangerous territory come the anniversary of The Good Friday Agreement. Stefaan, last word to you, just a brief summary of what you think the development in – the next developments in the European Union will be.
Stefaan De Rynck
First point, I will – for next development is important, but I think the Brexit story has also reminded ourselves about the achievements of the past and people took the single market for granted. The Customs Union, my colleagues in [inaudible – 71:35] as it’s called, nobody talked about Customs Union seven years ago. Now everybody has re-discovered the value of what we have done, so that’s very sad for the UK, I think in terms of the economic impact, but at least that’s re-discovery of some of the essential issues that the EU has achieved.
The future, it’s very hard to predict, obviously, but we are 27 countries now and there are nine that want to join. That’s 36 and there are three that are very happily installed in the European economic area, Norway, Lichtenstein, Iceland. So, there you have – that’s 39 in total, right? So, there are not many other European countries left. If you look at…
John Kampfner
There is one.
Stefaan De Rynck
…a map of Europe. Well, there’s Switzerland. There is – so, how it will pan out it’s hard to predict. Heather knows some these – of these nine countries much better than I do in terms of enlargement ambitions, as well, but clearly, the enlargement policy has gotten a new drive with the sad situation of Ukraine War. So, how that will come out I’m not sure, but that’s something, certainly, to watch out for.
And then you already mentioned to the pandemic, common purchase of vaccines, that’s a national competency, but EU did it, European Commission did it. The industrial deal that was now proposed, the green deal that you referred to, the trade policy and the changes there in the trade policy, all of that will, in my view, accelerate and deepen European integration over the years to come. And so, it will be a deeper integration. How that will be reconciled with the enlargement and the nine candidates and – of the nine countries that want to join, there are not candidates yet, is an open question for me.
What I – final point and I would say always in these discussions, I get the re-join question from a country that has just left, first of all. And the reception of the book, I think, is quite significant for something this country still has to grapple with, in my view. Some people want the remain side, which is semantically no longer makes sense, but it’s still talked about people on the remain side in a country that has left, find in this book confirmation of an existing view that the UK has lost its way and the things you said about how some people in Brussels talked about this. And some people on the Brexit side find confirmation of an intransigent EU and some of the paragraphs that I have written. To me, it seems that there’s still a, yeah, well, a need to accept a Brexit reality first, before you start a debate on all the issues that were raised here. In the EU, as soon as Theresa May wrote a letter in March 17, for us Brexit was a reality and we accepted it, and I’m not sure if this country has come to terms with the…
John Kampfner
That’s a very good Psychiatrist’s chair by way of ending this discussion. You’ve been a great audience, thank you very much, indeed, and to you online. Do read Stefaan’s book, it’s very, very good and a huge thanks to Lisa, to Heather and to Stefaan.
