This is why the EU and major EU capitals always say 'the ball is in the UK's court' - because from experience, all proposals coming from the EU are shot down in Westminster at first sight, regardless of whether by Labour or previous Tory governments.
Reposted from
Andrew Sparrow
UK will not accept EU offer to join pan-European customs union ‘at present time’, minister says - www.theguardian.com/politics/liv...
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A large part of there offer in 2024, was not about being Labour, it was not being the Tories.
I have my doubts.
Everything points to the UKG being happy with the hard Brexit which is already on the books.
Their manifesto and all their actions/inactions supports a hard Brexit.
Which to be clear the British think is a bad thing.
However, there is a huge caveat 'at the present time' is not saying no of course.
No.
Does it want it with the UK so its students and young people can move to London?
Yes.
The youth mobility proposal is for a time-limited, non-renewable visa that can only be issued once to an individual. It is *not* freedom of movement.
It's called a pan-European agreement, so it gets panned.
https://bsky.app/profile/faisalislam.bsky.social/post/3lghw3sxk6s23
Sadly they have no balls.
I will be a lot more critical if Starmer after summit doesn’t comeback with something like this.
But a different response could have been: 'Our government is working on the UK-EU reset and improving relations with our European partners. We will study all proposals in detail and whether they are of interest to the UK.'
7 months of dither and delay? Starmer and the 2025 party are rank incompetents.
I get your point. “At the present time” though is a massive signal it might happen.
That's in a nutshell the problem of the 🇬🇧 political class with negotiations. The real trade world doesn't work in that way. Just read threads from trade experts like David Henig - they shed lights on what is going wrong with UKG's approach
RE secrecy of negotiations - this is interesting: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/sep/04/government-secrecy-hindered-brexit-plans-watchdog-says