Thread by @DavidHenigUK

My new @ECIPE paper - on future UK-EU relations in the context of a changing EU without the UK - is published today. Also examines how various cross cutting trade issues will be affected by different future arrangements ecipe.org/publications/s… - I'll thread key points later

Some takeaways... The EU is a different organisation without the UK. The competitiveness agenda which the UK and ‘northern liberals’ pushed was highly successful. Without the UK, other countries need to work harder to push this agenda, for example. 1/
politico.eu/wp-content/upl…

It is not clear that the EU will want close relations with the UK in the future. The EU seeks strong relations with all neighbours, but there is a fear that the UK will show leaving could be a good economic move and seek to split the single market. 2/

The UK is not yet prepared for life outside of the EU. From Brexit day officials will no longer routinely attend EU meetings, but there is little sign of plans to replace this current influence, and we don’t know who would even run future negotiations. 3/

However the UK is likely to want close economic relations in the future, although there will be a trade off between this and global trade policy. Business will lobby for close ties, given 50% of UK trade is with the bloc, and we are already seeing evidence of this. 4/

The future UK-EU relationship will probably be the largest trade negotiation to be handled by the next Commission. If the UK seeks a close relationship this will give the EU a choice, between existing models, and finding a new approach for this specific relationship. 5/

Many EU-third country relations consist of an overall agreement, plus various dynamic arrangements. The future UK-EU relationship could be structured this way, and indeed allow the EU to refine this model for future trade agreements. 6/

The UK's former allies such as Sweden can help to broker a close relationship in the future, to benefit both the UK and EU. However this will also require the UK to build relationships rather than being as transactional as we have seen lately. 7/