After the Trump rocked the continent with his threat to take Greenland, the prime minister praises Europe as a ‘sleeping giant’
Britain’s “Brexit years” are over, Sir Keir Starmer will tell world leaders on Saturday as he calls for closer security ties with Europe – and less reliance on Donald Trump’s United States.
After transatlantic tensions flared following the US president’s repeated threats to take Greenland from Denmark, the prime minister will call for Europe to curb its dependence on the US, while praising the continent as a “sleeping giant” whose economic and military might can defeat its enemies.
After surviving the most tumultuous week of his premiership so far, including an attempt to oust him from office, Sir Keir will also warn that turning inwards, as the UK did during Brexit, would amount to “surrender” in a perilous era.


Unfortunately the old favourable terms are gone and won’t come back. Too toxic in Europe and only 1 country would need to veto it to stop it. Iit’s very unlikely the UK will rejoin in the near future as the Common Agricultural Programme remains broken, and signing up for the Euro would remain very toxic. Those are the two big exceptions we had. And of course, free movement of people remains politically toxic in the UK, and we’d never get an exception to that.
I was strongly in favour of remaining, and I’m leaning in favour of rejoining but I’m not massively keen. The reason being Europe was very politically controversial in British politics for decades and Brexit dominated politics for years over all other issues. I am in favour of rejoining the customs union; but even that will be a big ask in the UK and in Europe.
The right wing in the UK are against regulatory alignment and “taking orders” from Europe. And our broken first-past-the-post electoral system gives them disproportionate power in this country. European neighbours would rightly be risk-averse for signing a deal with the UK which another right wing government could just come along and tear up.
The UK should focus on electoral reform before ever considering rejoining the EU. We need true representative democracy, instead of the joke elections we have had such as Boris Johnson getting a huge majority in parliament. He got 44% of the vote and got 56% of the seats, forcing his version of Brexit on the country. And within that parliament the right wing had power within his party because there were enough of them to deny him his majority - their deal or no deal. So we got a hard Brexit. And any deals other governments make can be unpicked in the same way - a small extreme right wing minority can dominate the discourse.
So forget rejoining; push for proportional representation. Our democracy is backwards and stuck in the 19th century.
I think trust would be the big obstacle from the EU’s POV. No point allowing us back in if we’re just going to leave again when the next lot get in
I think if anybody can take us back into the EU it’ll have to be the Tories. Or if the Tories really are dead, Reform
Im not holding my breath