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Labour's Manifesto
"No return to the single market, customs union or freedom of movement". Improve position on veterinary certificates for food trade, help our touring musicians, and obtain mutual recognition of professional qualifications. Increase defence co-operation in an EU-UK Security Pact.
UK Government Aims
The government has broadened its negotiations to accommodate a long list of EU demands. They agreed to tackle fishing first. They are negotiating a Youth Opportunities scheme which some think is a version of free movement, an SPS Agreement to cover the food issues, re entry into Erasmus, entry into the EU Emissions trading scheme and the introduction of a UK version of the Carbon Borer Adjustment Mechanism. There has been no reported progress on travelling musicians nor on recognition of qualifications.
Why the UK Aims Are Misconceived
Far from boosting our growth rate, drawing closer to the EU has always lowered our growth rate. Why would this be any different? In the 20 years before we joined the EEC our growth rate was 3.4% a year. In the single market in our last 28 years in the EU it was under half that.
Far from improving our trade balance in goods, alignment and EU rules will worsen it, as it did in the EU. We have been in big deficit with the EU in goods trade all this century.
The UK does not lack special taxes and plenty of regulations. If more taxes and regulations were needed to bring growth we could always impose more of our own. Country comparison shows it is the countries with the lowest tax rates and proportionate regulations that grow fastest. Becoming a rule taker undermines Parliamentary scrutiny and government decision making in the UK, leaving the UK vulnerable to bad rules or to rules that are not fair to UK business.
The UK failed to insist on Nothing is agreed until all is agreed, and has embarked on a series of surrenders to EU demands. The EU has great negotiating discipline and refuses to agree on individual items all the time its aims are thwarted. The EU has not yet granted anything listed in the Manifesto as UK objectives.
To have a more successful renegotiation the UK should stick to its sensibly limited Manifesto objectives and get the EU to state its minimum price for achieving them. The government could then decide if any of them were worth buying, and could provide counter proposals. The government should not legally bind us on fish or students or anything else until there is a total package which conveys considerably more benefits to the UK than are currently on offer. So far all the concessions have been made on the UK side, as if we were the petitioners. As the UK runs such a large deficit in goods trade with the EU we are in practice the customer, who deserves a better deal or should otherwise look elsewhere for more trade and collaboration.
EU Aims
The EU wishes to lock the UK back into Single market laws and rules and to make the UK a rule taker. This is going to happen sector by sector. They have secured more UK fish for longer. They want the UK to join the UK Emission trading scheme and import-export system for electricity. They wish to re create free movement for all under 35 year olds. They want substantial sums in payment, charging the UK for every area of enhanced co-operation or common working. They want the UK to pay a solidarity payment to help level up parts of the EU. They wish to increase EU export opportunities to the UK especially in energy, food, defence equipment. They want the UK to pay for EU students to come under Erasmus and to cut fees for EU students coming to UK substantially to be the same as UK domestic student fees.
Fish
The UK immediately conceded 12 years of high fishing quotas for the EU, worth at least £6bn. This means another 12 years when the UK does not rebuild its fishing fleet and does not have increased catch landings to build a larger fish processing and food manufacturing industry here. The UK received nothing in exchange other than the promise of talks.
Youth Opportunities
At the insistence of the EU the UK is talking about allowing free entry of many young people into the UK as EU people want access to our jobs market, Colleges and English speaking opportunities. The UK is seeking to limit numbers and costs. The rapid deterioration in the UK jobs market for young people makes this even more worrying but may also limit the numbers a bit that want to come. The large imbalance in population size between UK and EU leaves the UK vulnerable to unreasonable pressures on housing , jobs and other facilities. There are always far more EU young people wanting to come to the UK than there are UK people wanting to move to the continent. The UK should require payments from the EU to cover some of the settlement costs.
Erasmus/Turing
The government has agreed to pay around Euro 800 m a year to belong to the Erasmus scheme, with a 30% discount in the first year. This is a huge increase on cost over our previous membership fee in the EU. When we were in the scheme many more EU students benefitted by coming to the UK than UK students going the other way. The Turing scheme the UK set up on leaving the EU helped more UK students, helped no EU students, and allowed UK students to go to non EU universities. Erasmus is EU only and entails UK taxpayers paying for EU students. It is much dearer than Turing which cost around £100m. It is difficult to se how this can pass any value for money test, or why we want to limit opportunities for our young people in this way.
SAFE - Defence
The EU wants the UK to pay billions to access the contracts for defence contractors supplying the EU weapons purchase scheme called SAFE. The UK is prepared to pay millions so the two sides are far apart. The government rightly thinks the EU's demands are too greedy. There should be no charge for the right to bid to supply weapons to allies. The Trade and Co-operation Treaty was meant to give us tariff free trade. The UK defence industries have good order book and any extra capacity they have should b e use to buy more weapons for UK forces given the run down to help Ukraine.
The EU-UK Security and Defence Partnership
This is so far outside the Treaties and offers flexible discussions between the UK and EU. It is more words than deeds. The UK already has formal partnership and joint mission arrangements through NATO with the leading European countries. The main aim should be to avoid anything that conflicts with NATO and to avoid anything that puts our defence under EU law.
Emissions Trading Scheme
The UK has its own Emissions Trading scheme to make energy dear and to tax high energy using industries for n et zero policy reasons. The EU scheme is similar but has a higher carbon price or tax. Joining the EU scheme will push up energy prices, accelerate de industrialisation, and lock us in, making a change of policy more difficult. This is an anti growth policy, intensifying the mage done by UK domestic policy with so many closures of oil and gas activity, oil refineries, petrochemical manufacture, blast furnaces for steel, ceramic, glass and paper plants and the rest.
SPS
The government has published a draft text of an SPS Agreement to ease sanitary checks on food products. This locks the UK into a wide range of EU Single market laws, making us a rule taker. The restrictive and costly EU laws will apply to all companies in the affected sectors including small businesses only working for the UK market and including exports to non EU destinations. There will be an EU charge for the service. It is difficult to see what benefits there will be for those who do export to the EU. There are dangers to UK innovation in farming and food production, to meeting specifications for non EU markets and to our balance of trade. The UK is a very small exporter of farm products to the continent but a large importer. The aim of the EU will be to boost its exports by more.
E-gates
Promises of easier entry to EU destinations for UK tourists have floundered on delays to the new technology and the EU decision that each member state neds to negotiate an e gates solution with the UK rather than the EU as a whole
Touring Musicians
No progress reported
Mutual Recognition of Professional Qualifications
No progress reported
