Juncker doesn’t belong at the Brexit table

Member states want to keep trade barriers low, but the Commission could wreck the negotiations

‘Britain’s example will make everyone realise it’s not worth leaving,” says Jean-Claude Juncker. The president of the European Commission, on hearing the UK will trigger Article 50 next week, demanded a £50 billion “divorce payment”.

So what if the UK has made some of the largest financial contributions of any member state? Since 2000 alone, we’ve paid £90 billion more to the European Union than we got back. So what if Britain’s military and security forces have helped keep countless EU citizens safe?

Juncker wants to make an “example” of Britain, making unreasonable cash demands designed to provoke. Desperate to defend his empire, Juncker vows to “punish” Britain, to deter others from leaving.

The vast majority of British voters back constructive relations with our continental counterparts. We’re leaving the EU, not Europe. Theresa May is right to declare Britain wants to remain Europe’s “best friend and neighbour”. It is disappointing Brussels starts our new relationship with incendiary demands for cash.

Agreeing to this payment, we’re told, is “a precondition” for any talks on Britain’s future trading relationship with the EU. The UK should make no such concession – for three reasons.

First, while we may indeed end up paying some “Brexit charge” – for EU pensions and other programmes we may want to stay part of – the actual amount is integral to what will clearly be a multifaceted negotiation. Far from opening the talks, any monetary payment should be the final piece of the Article 50 jigsaw.

Second, whatever Juncker says, there are huge industrial interests across the EU desperate for a UK trade deal. Germany’s all-powerful auto manufacturers know Britain is their largest market. For French food producers and Italian furnituremakers, UK access represents billions of euros of profits and countless jobs. As Juncker grandstands, commercial lobbies will be whispering to current and prospective political leaders for UK-EU trade barriers to be kept as low as possible.

The third reason to hold our nerve is that the UK will be fine if no EU deal is struck during the two-year window and we instead use World Trade Organisation rules.

“Half memberships and cherrypicking aren’t possible,” says Juncker. On that, at least, he makes sense. The UK should remain outside the single market and also outside the customs union. Negotiating “special UK membership” in return for freedom of movement concessions risks pulling the EU apart, as other members demand the same. The entire edifice, the single currency and all, could come crashing down. A “clean Brexit” is safer – for the UK and EU.

America’s EU exports totalled over a quarter of a trillion dollars last year, from outside the single market. Chinese, Japanese and Australian firms similarly enjoy access by meeting EU regulatory standards and, where necessary, paying low tariffs – and ours can do the same. Britain’s EU trade can continue even if we do no deal.

Outside the customs union, too, we can cut our own trade deals with the 85 per cent of the world economy beyond the EU, while enjoying lower import prices once we don’t have to pay Brussels’ common external tariff.

The UK is in a strong position. A free-trade agreement would be preferable, but we can trade happily with the EU on the same basis as other leading economies. Anyway, we already trade far more with the rest of the world – largely under WTO rules.

Juncker complains of “growing impatience in Brussels” with the UK, after May didn’t trigger Article 50 last week. In fact, the Government actually delayed out of respect, so as not to upstage tomorrow’s 60th anniversary celebrations of the EU’s founding Treaty of Rome.

“In Europe, you eat what’s on the table or you don’t sit at the table,” says Juncker. Such intransigence shows why he and his bureaucratic ilk should be excluded from the UK-EU talks. With goodwill and skill, elected politicians in the UK, Germany, France and economies across Europe should be able to negotiate calmly and sensibly, achieving a mutually acceptable outcome. President Juncker, you’ve had your pommes frites.