{"id":580610,"date":"2025-11-19T14:59:14","date_gmt":"2025-11-19T14:59:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/580610\/"},"modified":"2025-11-19T14:59:14","modified_gmt":"2025-11-19T14:59:14","slug":"brexit-reset-defence-deal-unravelling-as-uk-threatens-to-quit-talks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/580610\/","title":{"rendered":"Brexit reset defence deal unravelling as UK threatens to quit talks"},"content":{"rendered":"

A key part of Sir Keir Starmer\u2019s Brexit reset appeared to be unravelling on Wednesday as the Defence Secretary said the UK was willing to quit talks on a defence deal<\/a>.<\/p>\n

John Healey appeared downbeat about the chances of Britain joining the EU\u2019s Security Action for Europe (Safe) \u20ac150bn (\u00a3132bn) rearmament fund, telling The i Paper the UK was not willing to sign up for \u201cany price\u201d.<\/p>\n

The scheme is intended to use low-interest loans to boost Europe\u2019s arms production capacity and reduce reliance on US supplies in response to the growing threat from Russia and Donald Trump\u2019s withdrawal from the continent.<\/p>\n

New FeatureIn ShortQuick Stories. Same trusted journalism.<\/p>\n

Healey\u2019s remarks came as Politico<\/a> revealed that the two sides are far apart as negotiations approach the 30 November deadline. The EU is demanding between \u20ac4bn and \u20ac6.5bn (\u00a33.5bn to \u00a35.7bn) for Britain to \u201cpay to play\u201d, but the UK Government is only offering \u20ac200m to \u20ac300m (\u00a3176m to \u00a3265m) to cover administration costs and guarantees for loans under the scheme.<\/p>\n

Healey pointed out that European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen in May said a deal could be done on Safe \u201cwithin weeks\u201d after the two sides signed a security and defence pact that was the centrepiece of the Prime Minister\u2019s UK-EU summit.<\/p>\n

Instead, the Defence Secretary said the EU had waited for weeks in negotiations to reveal its proposals \u201cin some important areas\u201d, suggesting the demands for billions of pounds of cash had been sprung at the last minute.<\/p>\n

Healey made clear the UK was willing to walk away from the talks, as The i Paper reported last week<\/a>, and suggested British defence firms could instead do weapons-buying deals with European counterparts over Brussels\u2019 heads and outside the Safe framework.<\/p>\n

At a Downing Street press conference, Healey told The i Paper: \u201cMy message to the EU is what it\u2019s always been, we want a deal. <\/p>\n

\u201cBack in May, President von der Leyen talked about a deal within weeks on Safe and we\u2019ve been negotiating at each stage, ready for a deal, but also clear \u2013 clear that we\u2019re ready to pay a contribution to the costs of running the scheme, that\u2019s fair, ready to pay if there is good value for money for our taxpayers and our industry.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve waited weeks within the negotiations for the chance to see the European proposals in some important areas. <\/p>\n

\u201cFor us, we\u2019re ready to be part of this scheme, but we\u2019re not ready to be willing at any price. <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd for us as the UK, we have an industry that\u2019s second to none in Europe. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe will do these deals with other European countries. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe will play our part in reinforcing European security, and we recognise that responsibility we have as Britain, amongst European nations, particularly those in Nato, to play that role in future, and we will, in or out of Safe.\u201d<\/p>\n

The scheme is also seen as crucial to boosting the UK\u2019s manufacturing productivity as No 10 tries to boost the economy.<\/p>\n

The EU\u2019s initial offer is understood to include a demand of up to \u20ac6.5bn (\u00a35.7bn) for British defence firms to bid for contracts worth up to 50 per cent of the Brussels rearmament scheme, but the UK is offering much less.<\/p>\n

EU insiders last week believed Britain would eventually concede amid claims that UK defence firms have already lined up bids for loans with European counterparts, ready to submit on 30 November, creating pressure on the Government not to cut them out.<\/p>\n

\t\tYour next read<\/p>\n


\n\t\t\t\"Article <\/a><\/p>\n

But, Healey\u2019s public comments suggest the UK is frustrated with the EU\u2019s demands.<\/p>\n

David Henig, UK director of the European Centre for International Political Economy (ECIPE), said Safe talks were \u201cstruggling\u201d and that while some of the disagreements could be negotiating \u201ctheatre\u201d designed to sell compromises to domestic audiences, there are \u201csome genuine problems, particularly in Brussels\u201d.<\/p>\n

He suggested the EU was wrangling with questions over \u201chow to treat partners, dealing with the US and China, the budget, France-Germany relations \u2013 basically strategic uncertainty\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A key part of Sir Keir Starmer\u2019s Brexit reset appeared to be unravelling on Wednesday as the Defence…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":120776,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5226],"tags":[802,748,2993,2000,299,5187,1699,4884,2819,3027,16,3106,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-580610","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-brexit","8":"tag-brexit","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-defence","11":"tag-eu","12":"tag-europe","13":"tag-european","14":"tag-european-union","15":"tag-great-britain","16":"tag-john-healey","17":"tag-politics-news","18":"tag-uk","19":"tag-uk-politics","20":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115576961790706839","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/580610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=580610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/580610\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120776"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=580610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=580610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=580610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}