KEIR Starmer’s drive to rebind Britain to Brussels takes a major and irrevocable step forward at the EU-UK summit on May 19. He is preparing to sign a new ‘reset’ deal with the EU that will sweep away our sovereignty.
The new Pact, as it is called, focuses on foreign and defence policies and the defence industry. In an expert briefing given to peers and MPs before Easter, Lt Gen Jonathon Riley explained that, as far as the EU is concerned, it is a carbon copy of that proposed by Theresa May in her 2018-2019 withdrawal proposals that made a total mockery of Brexit and led to calls for, and finally, her resignation. It was removed from the exit negotiations in Boris Johnson’s ‘Future Partnership’ arrangements yet here it is back again – neither debated in Parliament let alone voted for by the country. UK interests over our Defence and Foreign policy will be seriously undermined.
As usual the mainstream media are following the party line and narrative. The Times sold it as a lucrative arms deal – ‘opening the door for British firms to tap into the EU’s €150 billion defence fund’. But as Lt Gen Riley revealed in his devastating presentation, this is far from the truth. Rather, the Labour government’s latest move is wholly ideological: ‘Its desire to tie Britain back into at least part of the EU, by concluding a pact on foreign affairs, defence and defence industry with Brussels’ he argued is not ‘for mutual strategic benefit, like Nato, but a mechanism to make the UK subject to the orders of the EU Commission on foreign affairs and defence policy’. All that was at risk under May is at risk once more, he said.
This is not, however, a simple matter of re-fighting the Brexit negotiations because the landscape has changed, he explained. Reviving this plan ‘will place the UK in a far deeper commitment on foreign affairs and defence than it ever agreed to while a member of the EU’. Why? Because in the meantime the EU Commission’s powers have been expanded to include the control of funding for defence and foreign affairs, and it has also taken on the management of the work to create joint defence capabilities through the Capability Development Plan and the Capability Development Mechanism. The pact, he warns, ‘as a powerful instrument of EU policy’, will inevitably lead to the UK being dragged back into EU Treaty texts governing defence and foreign policy’.
Evidence submitted in April by Veterans for Britain (VfB), which Lt Gen Riley chairs, to a House of Lords ‘Reset Committee’, shared with TCW, though formally responding to the committee’s sadly skewed and weighted questions* (for example, What would a successful reset of UK-EU relations look like?), takes no prisoners.
What follows is the first section of their evidence.
‘A Pact that follows the same general template as the Theresa May plan would see the UK as a non-voting, but subordinate, participant in a giant new EU defence architecture. A giant in terms of military capability it is not, but it is a giant in terms of the political mechanisms designed to steer policy, determine spending and control all that sovereign member states have done for themselves, while remaining accountable to their people, until now. The Pact, as a powerful instrument of EU policy, will inevitably lead to the UK being dragged back into EU Treaty texts governing defence and foreign policy.
‘The defence of any country and the means to conduct that defence are essential attributes of sovereignty. Sovereignty cannot be delegated, relegated or divided – if it is, it is lost. This is the first and most essential factor in understanding why handing control of our national defence to the EU is a catastrophic risk. If we hand over our defence, we risk losing our sovereignty and ceasing to be a country at all. The words of Professor Sir Michael Howard might touch a chord. Armed forces, to paraphrase him, are one of the essential attributes of statehood and no proper country can do without them, for they define how other nations view you and how they treat you.
‘Joining the Pact means that the UK will have to abide by EU Commission rules and strategies, and contribute to EU funds, as if we had never left the EU, at least in the realms of defence and foreign affairs. The pact would be sealed into the existing EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement, meaning that the EU Commission would be able to use trade or legal sanctions to enforce our participation. As with so much in the EU, everything is connected to everything else, meaning one must take all or nothing.
‘The proof that the Pact will use Theresa May’s template comes from the former EU Commissioner, Javier Serrano, who confirmed in recorded discussions at the Labour Party Conference in 2024 that the pact would use the ‘same template’ as the Political Declarations of 2018 and 2019. ‘Ministers have been more guarded, especially on the matter of the commitment of funds. However, the Government is already indicating that it has taken on the Theresa May proposal although the only admissions about what is actually in the pact have come from EU sources. For now, though, there is no sign of a Green Paper, a White Paper (except one from the EU which will be noted below), or any sort of debate on the matter.’
VfB then set out what the (worrying) steps are that the Government will take:
‘First, the Government would have to sign an Association Agreement with the EU, which would place the UK into three of the EU’s internal military structures: the European Defence Agency, (EDA) the European Defence Fund (EDF) and the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO). Concluding such an agreement accepts the principle that the UK will subject its policies and actions to scrutiny by a foreign body, an EU Commission-directed Defence Union, which is not accountable to the British parliament or people.
‘Since these structures are based on EU rules, texts and sections of treaties, to which the UK as a non-EU state is not subject, the Agreement would have to replace these with a range of new defence and foreign policy commitments. This is an essential step for any non-EU state willing to become an Associated State.
‘These arrangements are published on-line so that anyone with the time and patience can see just how onerous they are, and how these commitments erode the autonomy of a sovereign state. Moreover, under the Common Security and Defence Policy, it is clear that once in, disagreement with EU decisions or trying to impede them is difficult if not impossible – and there is no reciprocal commitment to uphold the UK’s sovereign interests.’
Over the coming days we will continue to report and relay the subsequent sections of VFB’s evidence submission focussing on implications of what would be out membership of the three mechanisms of European Defence Cooperation (EDA), European Defence Fund (EDF) and Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO)in the area of security and defence policy. These were established by a Council decision on 11 December 2017, and provide a legal framework for the member states to ‘jointly plan, develop and invest in shared capability projects, and enhance the operational readiness and contribution of armed forces’.
For any reader concerned about Labour’s big defence sell-out please sign this petition to ‘Hold a UK referendum before joining any defence and security pact with the EU‘ here.
*You can access Veterans for Britain’s fully referenced evidence submission which, at the start, details the questions they were required to respond to, here.
