The UK could re-enter the EU in a “Switzerland plus” package that could be negotiated within months of any decision to deepen ties with the bloc, the head of a European parliament committee has said.
Bernd Lange, who was heavily involved in Brexit negotiations, said: “I would love to see the UK back.” He said the EU missed the UK in decision-making because of its strong history of promoting open markets and democracy.
The former prime minister Boris Johnson rejected a Swiss-style relationship with the EU because it involved free movement and regulatory alignment, but it is often considered a halfway house to full membership of the bloc.
Switzerland is not a member of the EU but it struck a deal last year cementing its “frictionless access” to the single market across more than 100 agreements with a new framework deal.
This gives it access to the EU’s electricity market, space programmes, Erasmus and the Digital Europe research programme, and participation in the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control.
In exchange, Switzerland agreed to the free movement of people and to pay €375m (£326m) a year into the EU’s economic and cohesion funds.
Lange, a German MEP who has an important role in the European legislative process as chair of the European parliament’s trade committee, said the Switzerland framework could be a model for the UK, but it was a “passive” agreement that would not involve the country in EU decision-making.
“As a step by step [process], of course, there are a lot of possibilities, but I would love to have the UK come back also in the political decision-making process and politically be engaged. So we have the model of Switzerland … Switzerland plus, I would say, as that has some kinds of engagement but not the full membership.”
He said the decision about what relationship the UK wanted with the EU was entirely “in the hands of the UK”, but if it opted for something like Switzerland plus, an agreement could be achieved quickly, notwithstanding political hiccups.
He was speaking in London, where his schedule includes a meeting with the trade minister, Anas Sarwar, who is part of a team working on the UK’s new position on EU relations.
Lange also threw his weight behind Andy Burnham’s call for the EU not to lock the UK out of Made in Europe legislation that would restrict UK suppliers from inclusion in public procurement tenders as well as some corporate contracts such as car fleets.
French and German leaders were reportedly close on Thursday to agreeing a proposal that the UK could be included, provided it aligned with the EU’s 2024 tariffs on imports of Chinese electric vehicles.
This week the boss of Mercedes said the EU would be making a “deliberate choice” to harm the EU car industry if it did not allow the UK into the Made in Europe package.
Burnham has backing from the Netherlands, Germany and Italy. France, which came up with the legislative proposals, was opposed, saying it needed to get the legislation on the books urgently to guard against cheap competition from China, and that allowing the UK and other allied countries in could hold up the lawmaking.
Lange said the UK should “of course” be included because it was already aligned with the EU on environmental standards and employment laws.
He said France’s position was “not rational” and “also so emotional” but could be born from the desire to be seen as putting France first before next April’s presidential elections, in which Marine Le Pen, who is opposed to globalism, could take power.
Locking the UK out of Made in Europe could also cause a legal dispute over the trade and cooperation agreement that allows UK goods to be sold in the single market without barriers as long as they the meet the bloc’s standards.
The Made in Europe package, or the Industrial Accelerator Act, is expected to get political approval by the end of the year or early 2027, meaning Burnham does not have much time to get clauses inserted designating the UK as European for the purposes of the legislation.
But Lange said there could be time after that, given the processes of the European parliament, where three committees have scrutinising powers.
“There are 5,100 amendments,” he said, referring to the protracted process ahead, including one on UK inclusion.
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