Officially, Labour’s policy on Brexit and the EU is to ‘make Brexit work’. The party leadership has explained that they will not seek to reverse Brexit but will instead look for ways to better cooperate with the EU. The goal is to develop new agreements that will smooth trade, enhance foreign policy cooperation and generally improve relations.
The problem for Labour is that their position can also be summed up in another three-word phrase: ‘take back control’. The infamous Vote Leave slogan from the 2016 referendum has been subsumed into an almost cross-party consensus. Labour frontbenchers may not express it in those exact words, but they actively refuse any ideas that might seem to contradict the old red lines of the Brexit negotiations. Hence Labour rules our rejoining the Single Market, being part of a Customs Union with the EU or easing immigration rules for UK and EU citizens.
Evidently, Labour is trying to court voters who may have backed Brexit in 2016 and voted for Boris Johnson (running on another three-word slogan, ‘get Brexit done’) in 2019. Yet the ambition to make Brexit work, in order to succeed, must rest on convincing the growing number of Brexit-sceptics in Britain.
The risk for a future Labour government is that they tie their own hands and prevent themselves from making any significant offers to Britain’s pro-Europeans. This will limit the extent to which this growing chunk of Britain’s voters are willing to accommodate Brexit in any form. If poorly managed and without a swift adaptation to the reality on the ground, Labour could find itself caught out by a voter backlash as people tire of being told what they really wanted eight years ago rather than being given what they ask for today.
Last week provided a perfect case in point. On Thursday, the European Commission announced that it would seek a mandate from EU Member States to negotiate a youth mobility agreement with the UK. The proposed deal would give UK citizens aged 18 to 30 the right to stay for up to four years in an EU country. EU citizens would have the same right to come to the UK.
Many details would still need to be worked out, but in principle the agreement would be a welcome improvement to UK-EU relations and is exactly the kind of thing that many people have been asking for. Polling from last year showed that this kind of reciprocal youth mobility scheme would be supported by 68% of people, with just 19% against and 14% unsure.
It’s not an idea that would actually break any of the Brexit red lines as it wouldn’t be on the same level as the old freedom of movement, which provides the right to all EU citizens to move between all EU countries for as long as they wish. By any reasonable assessment, a youth mobility scheme is much more restrictive. That compatibility with Brexiteers’ position on immigration is further proven by the fact that the UK already has youth mobility schemes with countries like Australia, South Korea, Japan, Iceland and Uruguay (among others).
On the surface, this looks like a textbook example of how Labour can turn ‘make Brexit work’ into real policy. A broadly popular idea, that doesn’t undo Brexit and is merely an extension of what we are already doing with other partners around the world.
It was therefore naturally disheartening for many when officials from the Labour party dismissed the idea out of hand. A spokesperson was reported as saying that the party had no plans for such an agreement and would only say that they would look at other ways to improve UK-EU relations.
To a certain extent we have to assume this was a panicked overreaction. After all, if Labour really does believe these schemes are equivalent to free movement, then is it Labour’s policy to cancel all the other youth mobility schemes that the UK has? Clearly not. But does it mean that Labour is so fearful of how Brexit-backing media and a few voters in marginal seats might feel about this that they won’t sign up to any youth mobility agreement with the EU? That is the real danger.
What this suggests is that Labour’s dominant perspective on ‘make Brexit work’ is actually better understood as how to make Labour credible to Brexit supporters. The problem for Labour, and for Britain, is that this is not the same as actually making Brexit work.
Certainly, Labour has already indicated that they are willing to pursue some technical policies that would provide some degree of benefit, for instance through reduced paperwork for cross-border trade. Yet making Brexit even somewhat stable and sustainable will be a political process, not just a technical one. That means delivering benefits that are visible and tangible to ordinary people going through their everyday lives. Such benefits must also be actively present, not simply the absence of some problem (like food and medicine shortages).
To neglect this aspect of making Brexit work would mean repeating the mistakes made by the Tories. Where the Tory Brexiteers began with a referendum victory and a general election triumph, they have arrived in a world where a comfortable majority of the public wishes to overturn both those decisions. Events have unfolded this way because the Conservatives were unwilling to deliver policies that would convince pro-Europeans that it was possible or desirable to make peace with Brexit.
A youth mobility deal on its own likely wouldn’t even be enough. I personally don’t believe it is feasible to ‘make Brexit work’ at all. But it is the kind of necessary olive branch that Labour will need to extent to Britain’s Brexit-sceptic majority if it truly wants to avoid reopening Brexit at all costs.
In short, where considerable time has been devoted to selling Labour to previous Brexit supporters, the shifting political environment now demands that the party sell Brexit to today’s Labour voters.
Alternatively, if even this or similar measures are seen as too much for Labour to manage, then the party would be well-advised to prepare the path for a serious handbrake turn as public disappointment and anger will force them to run right through every Brexit red line to date.
And Gideon is one of the better UK jounalist, but still
Before the referendum, Gideon Rachman wrote a column in the FT describing various goodies ‘Bruxelles’ should really give GB. After the referendum, he wrote about how ‘Bruxelles’ would really have to give GB some sort of ‘good deal’.
Again and again, I asked him what Britain would offer in return for such a deal. He never deigned to answer me directly. Ditto for various other Brexit apologists.
Amazing how little has changed amongst those in and around the Westminster bubble.