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Britain will on Friday hold talks to deepen co-operation with the EU, including on university research and financial regulation, as UK prime minister Rishi Sunak seeks to build on his crushing defeat of Tory Eurosceptics in a key parliamentary vote this week.
Foreign secretary James Cleverly will discuss ways to develop the relationship following the 515 to 29 House of Commons vote to ratify Sunak’s new post-Brexit deal for Northern Ireland, the Windsor framework.
Many Conservative MPs view the result, which saw only 22 Tory MPs refuse to back the deal, as a watershed moment, in which the party moved on from its Brexit traumas and opened the way for more constructive relations with Brussels.
Former prime minister Boris Johnson was among the small group of dissenting Tories. The Daily Telegraph newspaper, normally a cheerleader for Johnson, a former columnist, said on its front page on Thursday: “The cults of Boris and Brexit are simultaneously imploding.”
One former Tory cabinet minister described the result as “absolutely devastating” for the hardcore pro-Brexit European Research Group, adding that Johnson had shown “a catastrophic failure of judgment”.
The ERG argues that 70 Tory MPs did not support the Windsor agreement — including those who abstained or were absent — and attacked Sunak for failing to offer more than a 90-minute debate on a single aspect of the deal.
Sir Bob Neill, chair of the Commons justice committee, said: “They just demonstrated their weakness by forcing a vote on this. It’s time to move on and have a more constructive relationship with the EU. With luck, it’s a turning point.”
Allies of Sunak said the ERG had not even managed to assemble enough MPs to constitute “a rebellion”, while a colleague of Cleverly said: “We have secured the Windsor agreement. We are now asking: ‘Where can we go next with this?’”
Talks between Cleverly and Maroš Šefčovič, European Commission vice-president, will on Friday start to explore new areas of bilateral co-operation, including a memorandum of understanding to establish regular dialogue on financial regulation.
More significant will be further scoping talks about Britain taking part in the €95bn Horizon research programme, which were frozen because of the Northern Ireland protocol dispute.
Sunak is sceptical about the cost to Britain of rejoining and negotiations about financial contributions will be tough. One Downing Street insider said: “We can look at continuing within Horizon but we are keeping our options open.”
Both sides are looking at deeper security co-operation, while Cleverly and Šefčovič will also discuss the government’s controversial Retained EU Law bill, which would automatically purge all EU laws from the British statute book at the end of 2023.
The bloc believes it would violate the level playing-field mandated by the post-Brexit Trade and Cooperation Agreement. But Number 10 insists it is proceeding with the bill, which has been heavily criticised by business groups for introducing legislative uncertainty. Ministers, though, are trying to focus on key areas, including new industries such as AI.
A senior Whitehall insider said the government would probably adopt the same approach to stemming a rebellion by Eurosceptic backbench MPs over the REUL bill as it had to Sunak’s deal on Northern Ireland.
“The Windsor framework showed what can be done when you stick to the ‘art of the possible’,” the person said, noting that the bill was likely to be heavily amended in the House of Lords. They added that business secretary Kemi Badenoch was “clear-eyed” about the risks of moving too quickly.
The view in Brussels is that Sunak’s accord has changed the political weather. “The Windsor framework has removed an obstacle,” said one EU diplomat, while cautioning that rebuilding ties would take time.
“Now we have a government we can work with that is not saying one thing to us and another to the British media. But there is a process to go through. It will not happen overnight.”
Talks over accession to Horizon have yet to start. Ursula von der Leyen, European Commission president, promised they would begin as soon as the framework was implemented. But the UK is waiting for a price: the programme is more than two years into a seven-year cycle, so its contribution will have to be adjusted.
After ministers from the bloc this week agreed key changes to the protocol, Šefčovič said the deal “allows us to turn a page and start afresh”.
The agenda on Friday includes a discussion on further collaboration on energy, especially trading electricity through the interconnectors between the UK and the EU, and the bloc’s proposals to permit higher subsidies for green technology.
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