Terry Reintke—my former colleague, co-president of the Greens/EFA Group in the European Parliament, is an MEP who has represented Germany since 2014. As a lifelong friend of the UK, and a founding member of the EU-UK Friendship Group, her lively hope and constant energy for campaigning to keep that friendship alive is an inspiration to us all. She recently took time out of her busy schedule for an interview with me for East Anglia Bylines’ ‘Our Place in Europe’ series.
For me, leaving behind all the wonderful experts I’d known in Brussels, my MEP colleagues and the staff in the Green Group and so on, was a kind of bereavement when I vacated my seat in January 2020.
Missing the UK
Do they miss us too, I wonder? Or are they glad to have us gone?
“You’re always here with me!” Terry says, pointing to pictures of the seven UK 2019 Green MEPs, standing on her filing cabinet. “But, of course, it’s horrible. I’m not going to lie: we miss you very much. We miss you as people, but also the way you did politics, the British MEPs – well,” she smiles, “let’s say, the ones in our part of the chamber. Obviously, the insulting speeches given in English in the plenary have gone…”
With Terry’s oblique reference to Nigel Farage and his Brexit group, I ask if they might be happy to be rid of us (the UK), even if she’s sad at losing her Green colleagues. Perhaps some things are possible, with us out of the way, such as the progress of the European green deal and other important projects.
”Yes, a bit, and in two ways,” Terry suggests. “For us greens, obviously, we’ve been a hit as a group. You were a very sizeable delegation, and with a strong green group, it’s more likely that you can achieve strong green policies. But I still think that we managed to move a lot of things forward and achieved much more in this legislature than in the last one. Partly because some of the most outspoken people who were trying to block it from happening have also left.”
Brexit’s fallout
But other than that, she says, it’s not so much in the European Parliament that the UK’s absence makes a difference, but in the Council. “I hear people say, ‘Okay, with the UK, this would have been much more difficult.’ Specifically, the resilience and recovery fund and some of the social legislation that we’ve managed to get across the line.
“I get the reasoning,” she adds “but I also always say that I think this is largely due to the fact that the UK has had governments that never really wanted to be a leading force in shaping EU policy. Instead, they were always trying to block things coming from Brussels.”
It has been a disastrous, missed opportunity, having devastating consequences for both the EU and the UK. But the damage has been particularly severe for the UK.
“Brexit has been an extraordinary removal of democratic and citizenship for the UK population and also for the EU citizens still resident in this country.”
A UK government with a more constructive attitude could have shaped the European project for good, and still could in the future, “given,” as she puts it, “the size and the influence that the UK has.”
This year the European parliament is holding elections for 705 MEPs across 27 nations. For Terry, it’s the first time the UK will not be electing MEPs and being part of the European family, determining our joint future for the next five years. A point of sadness for us both.
Brexit has been an extraordinary removal of democratic and citizenship for the UK population and also for the EU citizens still resident in this country, engineered under the guise that we would benefit from a gain in sovereignty, and the myth of needing to ‘make our own laws’. Yet we had more say in European laws than in Westminster where 43.6% of the popular vote gave the Conservatives an 80-seat majority.
As our government desperately searches for so-called “Brexit benefits”, I ask her if they laugh at us.
Terry smiles. “One of the things I think started a lot of laughter, but also the shaking of heads, was this whole thing about wine that can be sold in pints. My father was like ‘This is what they did it for, you know – this is the big Brexit!’”.
Hope for reunion
We both believe the UK will rejoin and when it happens, it’ll be under a government that sees membership and participation as an opportunity. “Then we’re going to get a much more constructive way of engaging with us at the level of the EU Council,” Terry says.
Despite her optimism, I still see political problems as the EU eyes the UK. We look dodgy at the moment on human rights, on rule of law, protection of democracy, protection of minorities. That would be a barrier, wouldn’t it?
Terry agrees. “I can tell you that the Rwanda legislation is something that is very, very questionable when it comes to human rights. This is not only from a European perspective, but also from the perspective within Britain. You’ve had court cases in the UK itself, so it’s not coming from the European level, even.”
The Rwanda plan is one of a number of recent UK policies that are problematic for the EU. “So there’d probably be an accession procedure,” Terry explains, “where we’d look at policies where the Copenhagen criteria would have to be fulfilled. That’s true for every country that wants to join the European Union.”
Path to rejoining
But what would the political conditions here in the UK need to be like for us to be able to start those accession discussions? Does Terry get the sense that we’re close to having the right attitudes and opportunities, so that we could move in that direction? Or are we going further away? Would we need proportional representation first? Would we need an end to extremism in the Conservative party?
Terry’s response is encouraging. She believes a priority is having a stable majority in favour of rejoining “and I don’t mean 52%:48%!” she adds.
I think this is achievable given we’re now seeing polls consistently showing over 60% say Brexit was a mistake, so not just prompted by temporary outrage at something.
There is one issue that concerns her: the more that the UK diverges on legislation, the harder rejoining becomes. “We have to be honest about that,” Terry says. “It will come at a cost for the UK.”
But tough accessions have become the norm for the EU, and the UK’s wouldn’t be as hard as some. She points to the agenda of expansion, with Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova and others, who are all in accession talks. This, Terry believes, creates a climate open to the possibility of rejoining happening, though, as she observes, the request obviously needs to come from the UK. The EU is not going to take the initiative to invite us back in.
Urgency for democratic unity
As the EU considers expansion, we are living through troubled times. “Globally, there’s a growing sense of urgency for democracies to stick close together,” Terry points out. “This is even more obvious than it was five or ten years ago. Just look at what’s happening in Ukraine, and also what may happen in the US.” It was after this interview that Trump suggested as president he’d scupper NATO, underscoring her point.
Closer to home, Germany is one of several countries that has seen the resurgence of the far right. But at least in her country the number of people out on the streets protesting about it is encouraging.
“Absolutely,” she responds. “And I think this is what is so strong about democracy in the UK. You have a Supreme Court that tells the government what it can and cannot do, and you have active citizens.
Rallying for rejoin
“During the Brexit campaign,” she adds, “look how many people stood up for the European Union! How many massive demonstrations you had, like the People’s Vote march in London when a million people took to the street. I think strong citizens’ movements is what we really need right now. And in the UK, this very strong pro-European citizens’ movement can counterbalance that authoritarian backlash that we’re facing.”
Despite this grassroots movement having successfully pivoted towards rejoin, backed by the European Movement UK, I hear so many people saying, ‘Oh, they wouldn’t want us back. Don’t deceive yourself into thinking we could get back soon.’
Terry has an answer for them. “I can only reiterate what I’ve said many times, Catherine: I think a very, very big majority of people would be thrilled to have the UK back in the EU.”
This is music to my ears.
