UK-EU Summit

Debate between Mike Martin and Julia Lopez

Tuesday 13th May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Julia Lopez]

If that is outside the boundaries of what is acceptable, I will withdraw the comment.

My second lesson is that when Labour negotiates, Britain loses. We have already seen it in this Parliament, from the Chagos islands to the backroom deals with the unions. It is ideological naivety dressed up as serious and sober diplomacy. Labour thinks that signing a deal is the same as securing a good one. It is not, and all that will become clear.

Let us remind ourselves that Brexit was never a rejection of Europe and its people. It was a demand for democratic control over our laws, our borders, our trade and our future.

[Mike Martin (Tunbridge Wells) (LD)]

The hon. Lady is a great fan of honesty in this Chamber, so I am sure that she will give me an honest answer. One way of understanding Brexit is that it replaced a circular flow of people with a one-way flow of people. Does she think that Brexit increased or decreased migration into this country?

[Julia Lopez]

Brexit allowed us to introduce a points-based system and that is what we did. I will accept that mistakes were made in the introduction of that points-based system, but the key is that we can tweak and tune that to accommodate the needs of our economy and those of the people we represent.

The British people could feel the world changing around them and they knew instinctively that the UK needed to be nimbler, faster and more accountable in responding to those currents, be they the movement of people or the regulation of businesses. We will not let it be said that there have been no Brexit benefits, because that is simply not true.

For a start, we no longer hand between £11 billion and £12 billion a year net to Brussels. We have secured trade deals, including from the fast-growing comprehensive and progressive agreement for trans-Pacific partnership nations. Whatever we think about last week’s US-UK tariff deal, we are not paying the same prohibitive trade taxes as the EU. We are setting our own course in areas such as AI, financial services and agritech. Those are not abstract wins or nostalgic impulses; they are real opportunities for a modern, outward-facing Britain.

If next week’s summit can ease practical frictions, that is all well and good. I want what works for British people. However, I am worried that Labour does not know what it wants, only that it wants a deal. I am worried it does not grasp what the EU will demand in return. And I am worried that Labour thinks slick comms matter more than real outcomes for the British people.

Today, we lay down a clear marker. On immigration, there should be no youth mobility scheme. It might sound harmless, but let us not be naive and have partial free movement by stealth. On defence and regulation, we want no dynamic alignment, and I am fascinated by the Minister’s refusal to say anything further on that matter. If Labour really thinks it has a great deal, there is a simple thing it could do, which is to bring that deal back to this House for a vote.