As the UK navigates its post-Brexit era, it faces a fundamental decision: will it be a rule-taker on the periphery of the European Union, or a sovereign trading nation that sets its own path? Keir Starmer has this week made his choice quite clear: we will be a rule-taker that follows every Brussels directive and pays for the privilege. The EU will start to charge us to follow their rules, and Starmer has, for some reason, agreed.
At stake is not just the principle of self-governance but our prosperity. Having our own rules and standards won’t stop us trading with Europe, but following Europe’s standards will stop us reaching our potential in trading with the rest of the world, and particularly with the United States. We will all be poorer. By turning back to Europe we will gradually shut ourselves off from the rest of the world.
Beyond trade, the EU rules the Government is dragging us back under are some of the most damaging to our domestic economy. These are the Net Zero rules and bogus food safety regulations that push up the price of gas and electric as well as food.
The EU’s new Tobacco Products Directive is emblematic of the kind of insane policy the UK was meant to escape through Brexit.
Taxes are being raised across the continent on tobacco to astronomical levels – levels only tried in places like Australia where tobacco-smuggling related crime is now worth 3 billion dollars, and arson attacks strike major cities almost weekly.
The UK will immediately come under pressure to replicate these taxes; the kind of pressure Starmer has a habit of caving in to. Either that, or he agrees with Europe that his own country should be punished for Brexit.
Europe will also completely disregard the risks to the United Kingdom’s integrity. EU market rules automatically apply in in Northern Ireland under the Windsor Framework, meaning that changes like these will immediately be felt there despite no democratic mandate for them.
The risks of cross-border smuggling given the very high tax rates will be extraordinary – and will cause crime and violence to spring up along the border. This is obviously the wrong model to try in the complex and sensitive political terrain in Northern Ireland.
The fact is that under the guise of harmonisation and “resetting” relations with the EU, Starmer has handed over issues so central to our independence, sovereignty and prosperity. We must be able to act independently and in our own self interest.
We must be able to buy and sell to whom we choose, and we must be accountable to our own citizens for those choices. Every part of that need is violated by Starmer’s reset, yet he had the cheek to try to sell it to the public in terms of e-gates at airports.
What Britain’s current government does not understand is that the EU is not a neutral partner. It has its own interests, dominated by those of the French and Germans, and its own failed assumptions and models of governance.
The EU has made it clear: the UK cannot “pick and choose” which regulations it follows in Northern Ireland, and they will take us to court if we resist.
We must consider our relationship with the EU as one of genuine cooperation for mutual gains, as we do with any other nation or bloc.
If Starmer genuinely had such a relationship with the EU, he would be able to point to a single benefit Britain receives for having handed over our fish, then our cash, agreeing to defend the continent against Russia and for now agreeing to take in French asylum claimants but return just one in every 17 who land here illegally.
It seems every time Starmer goes to negotiate, it’s to help them, and not ourselves. Focusing on trying to appease and placate the EU when we don’t have any demands of our own is amateurish – yet that is the approach of our naïve Prime Minister.
Instead we must not be nearsighted. We cannot build a coherent international standing, and strike comprehensive deals and partnerships elsewhere, if we are not able to assure partners that what we agree is under our own control.
The more we give to Brussels, the less room there is to agree with others. The solution is not to wait for Brussels to update its rules and hope we’re allowed to adjust ours in turn.
Britain needs to keep its options open and retain control of our own laws. On sovereignty, on trade, and on the principle that we make our own laws, on everything from fish to tobacco. The European Union writes rules for itself. Britain must do the same.