Brussels is pressing ahead with its bid for a deal on free movement for young people between the European Union and the UK – despite Sir Keir Starmer’s repeated rejections of an agreement.
The European Commission has made a youth mobility scheme a key demand amid the prime minister’s post-Brexit reset with Brussels after years of tense relations under successive Conservative administrations.
Despite Sir Keir’s insistence that the UK has no intention of agreeing such a deal, official documents show the European Council has tabled a discussion on the issue on Friday.
The youth mobility agreement’s inclusion on the agenda sends a strong message that the proposal is a priority for the bloc, which is hoping to use the meeting to formalise its negotiating position before presenting it to UK officials,The Independent understands.
While the EU has floated the idea informally before, it has never been formally proposed.
However, it is understood senior EU figures believe it is too early to see the mobility deal as a “red line” for the bloc.
Mike Galsworthy, chair of the pro-EU European Movement, warned that the bloc “expects a conversation on youth opportunity and mobility in any negotiations with Starmer”, adding that the PM “cannot keep saying ‘no’ to reality forever”.
“It makes it all the more bizarre a position to maintain when the UK public overwhelmingly back the principle and it would clearly do a power of good.
“Furthermore, the EU has never negotiated such a youth mobility scheme before, so Starmer has carte blanche to approach it in a way that is bespoke for Britain.
“Refusing even to look a gift horse in the mouth at this stage would seem short of acting in good faith”, he told The Independent.
It comes just days after Sandro Gozi, the new chair of the European delegation to the EU-UK Parliamentary Assembly, told The Independent the bloc is looking to put a youth free-movement deal at the centre of the relationship “reset”.
He said there is a renewed desire within the EU for closer ties with Britain following Donald Trump’s re-election in the United States, amid growing concerns over the president-elect’s commitment to Nato and fears of a global trade war.
Mr Gozi said the EU sees the Republican’s election as a “big opportunity to kick off a new partnership”.
While Sir Keir has previously insisted the UK will not rejoin the bloc within his lifetime, he has pledged to “make Brexit work” by renegotiating the deal agreed upon by Boris Johnson and pursue closer co-operation, particularly on defence, security and trade.
But in October, the prime minister’s official spokesman said the UK “will not be considering” a youth mobility scheme.
The proposal, which would likely mirror similar arrangements Britain already has with countries including Australia and Japan, would allow 18 to 35-year-olds to move and work freely between countries for up to two years.
Former deputy prime minister Lord Heseltine, president of the European Movement, previously told The Independent that a “failure to contemplate this is a part of the conspiracy of silence that has denied the British people a proper understanding of the disaster of Brexit.”
Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey also piled pressure on the prime minister to rethink his stance on the deal, calling for him to “have some urgency in rebuilding that relationship”.
“Our willingness to counter even the youth mobility scheme is quite odd and bad”, he told journalists at a press gallery lunch in Westminster in October.
The Foreign Office has been contacted for comment.