Keir Starmer is poised to sign his Brexit ‘reset’ deal today despite alarm at huge concessions in a ‘surrender summit’.
A late breakthrough in negotiations has paved the way for an agreement to be unveiled at a meeting with Ursula von der Leyen in London.
However, concerns are running high over the price that the UK has had to pay in return for smoother trade.
There are claims that EU fishing boats will be guaranteed access to UK waters on the current terms for 12 years, after the French mounted a last-minute ambush demanding longer guarantees. Ministers are due to announce a £360million fund to help appease furious coastal communities.
Sir Keir is also expected to sign the UK up to the Erasmus+ scheme, although he could stop short of immediately confirming a ‘youth mobility’ arrangement giving millions of Europeans rights to live, study and work here for up to three years.
In return, the deal would see checks on lorries taking food to the continent lifted permanently – ending the so-called ‘sausage wars – but the UK will have to obey some Brussels rules.
Defence firms will also gain access to a £126billion EU-wide weapons fund, although British taxpayers face having to pay millions for the privilege.
Brit tourists are set to be spared queues when travelling to the continent, with permission to use e-gates at European airports. And ministers have hinted that red tape on taking pets abroad could be eased.
Europe minister Nick Thomas-Symonds confirmed this morning that the terms had been sealed, following a frantic final few hours of haggling.
But Kemi Badenoch pointed out that 12 years of fishing rights would be three times longer than the government originally wanted. ‘We’re becoming a rule-taker from Brussels once again,’ she warned.
Nigel Farage said it would be ‘the end of the fishing industry’.
Under the terms of Boris Johnson’s 2020 Brexit deal, the EU gave up 25 per cent of its fishing quotas – phased up to 2026. From next year there were due to be annual negotiations, which the UK fishing industry hoped would provide leverage to restore its hold.
However, quotas could now be frozen until at least 2038.
In a round of interviews earlier, Trade Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said there is a ‘real prize’ for the country.
‘The current deal has huge gaps in it, not just on areas to do with trade, but to do with security as well,’ he told Times Radio.
‘So this is about making people better off, about making the country more secure, about making sure there are more jobs in the UK.’
Mr Reynolds hinted that a youth mobility scheme would have a cap on numbers, insisting other existing arrangements were ‘limited’ and ‘targeted’.
‘It’s not the kind of access people had when we were members of the European Union,’ he said.
‘I think last year, we issued, as a country about 24,000 visas for the various youth mobility schemes. So this is not immigration, it’s not freedom of movement. It’s something very different.
‘Any scheme like this, if you look at the 13 we already have, they are capped, yes,’ he added.
Government sources said ‘huge progress’ has been made in agreeing ‘a mutually beneficial deal with the EU’ that would ‘deliver for British working people’.
But they insisted the Prime Minister has been ‘clear that he will only agree a deal which delivers in the national interest of the United Kingdom’.
Both Ms Badenoch and Reform UK leader Nigel Farage have already described the deal as a ‘surrender’, despite the full details not yet being known, and indicated they would tear it up if they came to power.
Youth mobility could prove a major sticking point for the Opposition, and Mrs Badenoch said she fears it will involve a return to free movement ‘by the back door’.
The Tories have also set out a series of ‘red lines’ on fishing rights, including ensuring exclusive access to Britain’s territorial sea and resisting ‘a multi-year agreement which only benefits France’.
The PM has been urged not to give in to the EU’s demands or give up the Brexit freedoms that 17.4million voted for.
Shadow Foreign Secretary Dame Priti Patel told the Mail: ‘Labour’s great Brexit betrayal consists of them backsliding on our freedoms and hard-won sovereignty.’