Governments make mistakes; Prime Ministers make mistakes that cost billions. Keir Starmer’s EU reset is shaping up as the latter. Far from negotiating as an equal, Britain is showing its hand, and Brussels is collecting the chips.
So here we are again: Britain is back in the familiar position of writing cheques to Brussels in the hope of being taken seriously. The so-called “reset” with the European Union, trumpeted by Downing Street as a new era of “grown-up cooperation,” looks, on closer inspection, like an old story dressed up in new language.
According to The Times, the European Commission is demanding that Britain pay between €4 billion and €6.5 billion simply to compete for defence contracts under its €150 billion European rearmament fund — a scheme with a November 30th deadline. In other words, a NATO cornerstone nation, with one of the world’s most advanced defence sectors, must now pay Brussels for the privilege of bidding to build Europe’s weapons.
This is not partnership. It is tribute. And it tells us something profoundly uncomfortable about Britain’s place in the world under the lamentable “leadership” of Sir Keir Starmer.
Brussels, for all its faults, has one enduring virtue: an unerring sense of opportunity. It knows when a counterpart is weak, distracted, and in need of applause. It has realised, quite correctly, that Britain currently has a Prime Minister utterly reliant on favourable headlines and terrified of appearing “uncooperative” on the European stage.
In this, the EU is absolutely right.
Sir Keir’s government is, at heart, a public-relations exercise in search of a foreign policy. His instinct is managerial, not visionary — a lawyer’s reflex to compromise, to concede, to tidy things up quietly and hope the noise subsides. In Brussels, this has been read with perfect accuracy as weakness.
To European officials, Starmer’s Britain looks like the easiest negotiating partner they have faced in decades: a government desperate to be seen as competent, stable and European-minded, even if that means swallowing terms that no self-respecting state should accept.
The Return of the Chequebook
The defence-contract demand is the sharpest symbol yet of this dynamic. The EU knows Britain wants back into the conversation about European security. It also knows that the UK’s own defence industry, long locked out of major EU procurement since Brexit, is lobbying for access. And so, with exquisite timing, Brussels has set a price – Pay us between €4 and €6.5 billion, and you may bid for work funded by our rearmament fund. Fail to do so by November 30th, and your firms will stay excluded.
From the EU’s perspective, this is impeccable strategy. From Britain’s, it is humiliation.
That Britain should have to pay to compete in European defence contracts — after decades of underwriting the continent’s security through NATO, intelligence sharing and nuclear deterrence — is absurd. Yet Starmer’s ministers, ever anxious to be seen as “grown-ups in the room,” will dress it up as pragmatism, cooperation, renewal.
What it really is, of course, is a quiet relapse into dependence.
Starmer’s problem is that he confuses respectability with success. To him, the EU’s approval is proof of competence. The Commission, having seen this psychology before, is playing him like a violin.
The Prime Minister’s overriding fear is not a rebuff from Brussels, but a bad headline at home — the accusation that he has “wrecked relations” or “squandered goodwill.” Every move he makes is calibrated for the next day’s front page, not the next decade’s reality.
And so, policy becomes theatre. Paying billions for symbolic participation in an EU defence fund will allow Starmer to boast of “re-engagement.” Agreeing to food-standard alignment will be sold as “reducing friction.” Handing back fishing rights for another twelve years will be spun as “stability for coastal communities.”
Each gesture is designed to look responsible. Yet together, they form a pattern of quiet retreat — a slow reabsorption into the Brussels system that Britain once voted to leave, only at a far greater price.
When Weakness Looks Like Cooperation
There is, of course, a difference between diplomacy and deference. The former protects national interests; the latter disguises surrender as statesmanship. The EU has always preferred dealing with the latter.
It is now being rewarded with a British government – possibly the most lamentable since that of Harold Wilson – that mistakes mildness for maturity. Civil-service mandarins, many of whom never reconciled themselves to Brexit, are again whispering that “alignment” is the only way forward. The Treasury, ever fond of predictable budgets, is willing to fund it. And Starmer, desperate for a European stage on which to appear respectable, nods along.
The result is a Britain that no longer acts like an independent power but like a supplicant seeking approval.
The irony is painful. The very people who mocked Boris Johnson for bluster are now defending a far more costly form of compliance. Johnson’s government may have been chaotic, but it at least recognised that sovereignty meant something tangible — the right to refuse terms that insulted national dignity.
Keir Starmer’s version of leadership is the opposite: quiet acquiescence in the name of grown-up politics. Yet grown-up politics, as the EU understands it, is about leverage. When Brussels smells weakness, it extracts concessions. When it sees indecision, it names the price. And when it finds a counterpart who values harmony over strength, it cashes in.
Why Brussels Is Right
Here lies the uncomfortable truth: Brussels’ reading of the British situation is not cynical. It is correct.
It has correctly identified that Britain’s current leadership is risk-averse, media-driven, and lacking any strategic doctrine. It knows that Downing Street is paralysed by fear of economic instability and therefore desperate for calm relations at almost any cost.
The EU’s negotiators, hardened by decades of transactional diplomacy, are not dealing with a Thatcher. They are dealing with a cautious solicitor in search of good press – or at least what he is told by his acolytes is “good press”. Naturally, they are pressing their advantage.
One should admire their efficiency, and wish it could be replicated in Westminster and Whitehall.
The Danger of Paying to Be Heard
What makes this moment so perilous is that the EU’s leverage now extends far beyond economics. Defence, energy, and technology — once the cornerstones of British independence — are slowly being reopened to Brussels’ influence.
Paying billions to “compete” for contracts under an EU-controlled rearmament scheme sets a precedent that could spread elsewhere. Why not similar fees for access to energy projects, or research programmes, or space systems? Bit by bit, Britain becomes the EU’s best customer — and least influential partner.
If the Prime Minister signs up, he will have institutionalised Britain’s new status: a paying observer in a club it once helped to build.
The Price of Weak Leadership
The truth of the matter is brutally simple. Brussels has spotted a weak Prime Minister and is exploiting him. It is doing so with calculation and confidence, because it knows exactly what motivates Keir Starmer: a desperate hunger for legitimacy.
The EU will continue to name its price, and Britain will continue to pay — until someone in Downing Street remembers that respect is earned by resolve, not bought by contribution.
Brussels is not being cynical in seizing this moment. It is being rational. It has judged Britain’s political leadership accurately. And until that changes, we should expect more invoices, more concessions, and more “resets” that look suspiciously like retreats.
In this, Brussels is absolutely right. It has read our Prime Minister far better than he has read himself.
Keir Starmer’s First 15 Months: Broken Promises, Border Chaos and a Government Losing Its Grip
Click here for more News & Current Affairs at EU Today
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
