LONDON (Reuters) – Reducing Britain’s trade barriers with the European Union will improve the growth prospects of both, finance minister Rachel Reeves will tell her euro zone counterparts on Monday when she meets the group for the first time.
Britain’s Labour government is pushing to reset ties with the EU after coming to power in July and improve trading relations in a bid to raise growth.
Labour says that previous Conservative governments damaged EU relations during fractious negotiations to leave the bloc, and Reeves’ address at the so-called “Eurogroup” will be the first by a British finance minister since Brexit.
“I believe that a closer economic relationship between the UK and the EU is not a zero-sum game. It’s about improving both our growth prospects,” Reeves will tell euro zone finance ministers, according to extracts from her speech.
“The reset in relations is about doing what is the best interests of our shared economies and those that depend on it. That means breaking down barriers to trade.”
Prime Minister Keir Starmer is aiming to reduce border checks by agreeing a new veterinary agreement, but has pledged not to rejoin the bloc’s single market or customs union, and has ruled out any return to freedom of movement.
With the EU demanding an improved youth mobility scheme, both sides have acknowledged that negotiations – expected to start in earnest next year – will not be straightforward.
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Despite those differences, Reeves said that talks with the EU could be productive and would not be defined by the “division and chaos” of the past few years.
“We want a relationship built on trust, mutual respect, and pragmatism,” she will say, according to the extracts.
“A mature, business-like relationship where we can put behind us the low ambitions of the past and move forward, focused instead on all that we have in common.”
(Reporting by Alistair Smout. Editing by Jane Merriman)
