Chris Philp: Starmer’s ‘surrender summit’ risks becoming a UK EU-turn on borders and much more

Rt Hon Chris Philp MP is the Shadow Home Secretary.

​Today, the Prime Minister is hosting an EU surrender summit with the intention of achieving some sort of so-called deal. We know what Labour’s deals look like. When Labour negotiates, Britain loses.

So far, he has crossed the road to betray what’s best for Britain.

He is paying to give away the Chagos Islands for no good reason.  The India trade deal handed tax breaks to Indian workers, while UK firms face tax increases. Starmer’s talks with Trump left us with worse US tariffs than we had in March. And if today is anything like his trip to Albania last week, where the Albanian Prime Minister stood next to Starmer and told the media he wasn’t interested in the plans Starmer had travelled there to announce, it will be another national embarrassment.

Every day it becomes clearer that Keir Starmer is the world’s worst negotiator. And countries around the world are now seeing Britain as a soft touch. Starmer is like the schoolboy handing over lunch money — and the world’s playground bullies are lining up.

Spain now even see Gibraltar as up being for grabs. Far from being an island of strangers, we are fast becoming a nation of victims.

We are told the UK-EU summit isn’t about reversing Brexit. Of course it is. It is a surrender summit. Free movement, giving up fish, following future EU rules, a potentially uncapped pan-European youth mobility scheme, an asylum quota. Give it a fresh coat of paint, and suddenly it’s not betrayal – merely “alignment.”

In the latest round of Brussels wish lists, we’re told that the EU wants home fee status restored for its students, leaving British taxpayers to once again foot the bill, even while our own students drown in debt and at a time when our universities are under strain.

The potentially uncapped pan-European youth mobility scheme  is free movement by the back door. We have previously signed fair, reciprocal deals with countries like Australia and New Zealand, with strictly limited numbers. But this isn’t that. Tens of millions of EU citizens aged up to 30 or even 35 could be in scope.

Meanwhile, the Government can’t keep its own story straight. In February, the Home Secretary ruled out a youth mobility deal. In March, the Paymaster General hinted it was on the table. In April, the Paymaster General ruled it out again, only to rule it back in by May. Similarly, in late January, Labour Ministers ruled out joining the Pan-Euro-Med area. Three days later, the Chancellor said they were looking into it. By the 3rd of February, they ruled it out again. This is a complete mess and government by improvisation.

But even last Monday, Labour voted against our amendment for a legally binding cap on migration – claiming that caps “don’t work.” But the youth mobility schemes we’ve previously signed have all been capped. So, the government should support a capped EU scheme, in which case they should admit our policy was correct, or they’re prepared to let millions come in, right after telling the country that net migration must come down.

And while the EU demand access to our labour market, they say nothing of taking back failed asylum seekers. Under the old Dublin III rules, we were a net recipient. More arrived than we ever sent back. Now the EU wants to reinstate all their perks of membership without any of the responsibilities.

A summit that should defend our sovereignty is instead paving the way back to everything we voted to leave behind. Brussels knows exactly what it wants, and Britain is left exposed.

If Labour delivers another backdoor betrayal, the Conservative Party will reverse it.

We must remember exactly what the Brexit vote represented. Brexit was independence. It was the British people saying that we want to control our laws, our borders, our future. We want a country that listens when we speak, that acts when we vote, and that dares to stand up. But Starmer is eager to give that all away.

Keir Starmer had said he would ‘always’ argue in favour of immigration and ‘protect’ free movement. He said free movement has been hugely beneficial. It is no wonder he is so eager to return to it.

When we voted for Brexit, Starmer spent three years trying to kill it in committee rooms, amendments, and legal tricks. We all watched him twist every rule, exploit every loophole, use every inch of Parliamentary procedure to frustrate the will of the people.

The truth is simple with Labour: they don’t believe in borders, they don’t believe in the Brexit vote, and most damning of all – they don’t trust the people who put them there.

We will not let them do it.

The Conservative Party will challenge any stitch-up deal that sells out our sovereignty. No compulsory asylum quotas, no uncapped pan-European youth mobility schemes, no signing up to EU laws today and new ones in the future, no surrender of fish and no resumption of payments. We will stand by every man and woman who dared to believe.

This country is not a dormitory for the world, it is our home. However when it’s left to lawyers and ideologues, you get chaos dressed as compassion. It is not extreme to demand control. It is not wrong to expect a government to defend its borders.

If we want to thrive, we need the spine to fight back.