Question Time panel split over UK rejoining EU within ten years

Panel split

A panel debate on whether the UK should seek to rejoin the European Union within ten years exposed deep divisions over the economics, costs and political reality of a return.

The question was put by an audience member, Elizabeth Johnson, who noted that Canada and the EU are forging closer ties and asked whether now was the time for the UK to seek to join the EU within the next decade. The host noted that a senior Labour figure had said last year he hoped to see the UK rejoin in his lifetime, but had since described the issue as a discussion for another day. Tony Blair was also cited as saying Britain should work towards rejoining a significantly reformed EU over the next decade, though the host added that Blair had previously said Brexit was never the answer and rejoining was not the answer either.

The pro-rejoin case

One panellist, Josh, made the pro-rejoin case. He said he voted to remain, had attended protests and wanted the UK at the heart of Europe again. His main argument was economic. He said the economy had been flatlining, that businesses in Eastbourne once traded well with the EU and now faced barriers, paperwork, red tape and qualifications that were no longer automatically recognised. He called for a new customs union and a return to the single market, citing Frontier Economics forecasts that 20 to 27 billion pounds a year could come back into the economy. He acknowledged the UK used to pay about 7.5 billion pounds a year to the EU between 2016 and 2019, and said estimates for full rejoin ranged from 20 billion to 40 billion pounds a year. He argued a new defence and growth partnership could cost 2.7 billion pounds a year against a 27 billion pound gain, and said leaving the EU had left a 90 billion pound black hole.

The host challenged those figures, asking how the cost could be known and who Frontier Economics was. Josh replied that it was an organisation doing high quality research.

The counter-argument

Another panellist, Andrew, pushed back. He said there had been good economic arguments for not leaving the EU in 2016, but that the Remain campaign had been negative and had lost. He argued the debate was stuck in the past because Europe had changed since 2016. He pointed to the leaders then, Francois Hollande in France, Angela Merkel in Germany and Matteo Renzi in Italy, and said the political landscape now featured a rising hard right. He said the AfD in Germany would win more seats than the Social Democrats and Christian Democrats combined if an election were held tomorrow, that Marine Le Pen wins every opinion poll in France, and that six or seven countries would be run by right or hard-right governments by this time next year. He also said the UK's growth rate every year since COVID had been higher than the growth rates of Germany, Italy and France, and argued that joining the single market and customs union would not improve things because the UK was already growing faster than the three biggest economies in the customs union.

Josh responded by focusing on the United States. He described Donald Trump as the most unreliable US partner in his lifetime and said the UK could not trust the US on defence, the economy or tariffs. He argued the UK should lean into its relationships with European neighbours to make its economy resilient.

Audience reaction

Audience members also took sides. A young man who had just turned 18 at the time of the Brexit vote said he voted to remain and now wanted to rejoin. He called Brexit one of the worst things the country had ever done, said it had removed opportunities for young people and made travel harder, and said he struggled to see tangible benefits. When the discussion turned to border security, he said the small boats crisis was less of a problem inside the EU, though the host noted that illegal immigration had still existed in different forms. A woman in the audience said it was telling that the most googled question in the UK the day after the referendum was 'what is the EU', and she challenged the suggestion that people who wanted to remain had done nothing before the vote.