Britain’s trade deal with the United States is nothing more than a “shakedown” EU officials believe as they prepare for a crunch summit with the UK over softer-Brexit plans.
They have also expressed disappointment that the UK didn’t push back more against the threat of Trump’s tariffs, as Europe is doing.
The Prime Minister is due to host EU leaders in London on Monday for what is set to be the first annual summit between the two sides and at which agreements on closer trader relations are hoped to be reach as Starmer’s Brexit reset.
And the dismissal of the ‘historic’ deal between Britain and America opens the way for a more substantive agreement with the EU, which European officials indicated they want to see happen.
“This was a shakedown,” said one EU diplomat. “Britain is better off than a week ago, but worse off than at the start of the year, before Trump came up with his absurd tariffs.”
Keir Starmer and Donald Trump last week announced the first trade deal of any nation with the US since Trump plunged the global economy into turmoil with a baseline tariff of at least 10 per for every nation and 25 per cent on cars and steel.
Britain’s ‘historic’ deal managed to remove the tariffs on steel and reduce the tariffs on cars to ten per cent, and opened up the market for mutual beef exports.
But the baseline levy of 10 per cent for UK goods remain.
Starmer has consistently said that the UK does not have to choose between the US and the EU as he seeks a better deal with Europe, with many observers arguing that a US deal might conflict with EU trade.
But European officials are dismissive of the UK-US deal, arguing it isn’t a trade deal at all, but rather a reprieve from tariffs, and that the real deal remains to be struck with the EU.
Another EU official added: “Starmer gave lip service to Trump’s tactics, which are those of the schoolyard bully.”
The also expressed disappointment that the Prime Minister did not push back harder against Trump’s tariffs against what the president called “our oldest ally.”
EU and UK already ‘connected‘
But he also claimed that Britain’s closer relations on with the EU on issues such as defence and energy trading made a substantive trade deal more likely.
“We are already much more closely connected to the UK and we’re working together to improve it even more in various areas,” he added.
“And we won’t impose tariffs on Britain from one day to the next for arbitrary reasons.”
EU and UK negotiators are still scrambling to wrap up joint declarations covering defence, geopolitics and future cooperation, which could help repair their trading relationship.
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Also crucial to the talks will be the thorny issue of youth mobility, or under-30s migration, which is a key demand of Brussels’ but likely to conflict with Starmer’s clampdown on immigration figures.
Just hours before the US-UK deal was announced, the European Commission laid out its plans to retaliate against the so-called “reciprocal” tariffs.
The EU executive threatened its own tariffs on €95bn of US exports, including cars and vehicle parts, if talks with Washington fail to end their trade conflict. The proposed measures would target key industrial goods, including Boeing aircraft, US-made cars and bourbon whiskey.
No 10 has been approached for comment
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