We will make as much of this as we can. We will go as far as we can. But the truth is that our partnership cannot and will not be the same as before.
President Ursula von der Leyen at the London School of Economics said 31 January BREXIT DAY will be a tough and emotional day!
Speech at the London School of Economics with the title "Old friends, new beginnings - building another future for the EU-UK partnership" followed by Q&A.
We will make as much of this as we can. We will go as far as we can.
But the truth is that our partnership cannot and will not be the same as before.
And it cannot and will not be as close as before – because with every choice comes a consequence. With every decision comes a trade-off. Without the free movement of people, you cannot have the free movement of capital, goods and services. Without a level playing field on environment, labour, taxation and state aid, you cannot have the highest quality access to the world's largest single market.
The more divergence there is, the more distant the partnership has to be. And without an extension of the transition period beyond 2020, you cannot expect to agree on every single aspect of our new partnership. We will have to prioritise. The European Union's objectives in the negotiation are clear. We will work for solutions that uphold the integrity of the EU, its single market and its Customs Union. There can be no compromise on this.
But we are ready to design a new partnership with zero tariffs, zero quotas, zero dumping. A partnership that goes well beyond trade and is unprecedented in scope. Everything from climate action to data protection, fisheries to energy, transport to space, financial services to security. And we are ready to work day and night to get as much of this done within the timeframe we have.
None of this means it will be easy, but we start this negotiation from a position of certainty, goodwill, shared interests and purpose. And we should be optimistic. We need to be optimistic! We need to be optimistic for those young people leaving school in the next few years who want to study and learn abroad. We need to look at how British and EU researchers could work together to find solutions to our most pressing challenges or to develop the new technologies the world needs. And we must ensure that we continue to work together on upholding peace and security in Europe and around the world. We must build a new, comprehensive security partnership to fight cross-border threats, ranging from terrorism to cyber-security to counter-intelligence. Events in recent years in Salisbury, Manchester, London and right across Europe have underlined the need for us to work together on our mutual security.
The threat of terrorism is real and we have to share the necessary information and intelligence between Europe and the UK to stop terrorists from crossing borders and attacking our way of life.
The nature of today's threats means that no one can deal with these challenges on its own. This is even more true for foreign policy. Even though Britain will be outside the European decision-making structures, there will be plenty of need for common responses to address foreign, security and development challenges near and far. Be it in our immediate neighbourhood in the East and South, or in the Horn of Africa, Sahel and Sub-Saharan Africa; Or be it in the wider Middle East or different parts of Latin America and Asia. The truth is that Brexit will not resolve any of the existing challenges for the EU nor the UK. Even being apart and not bound by the Treaties, it will require intensive cooperation on our foreign and security policies. That is essential, because we share so much experience and we stand for so many of the same values. We have to uphold these values, not only when it is easy, but above all when it is hard.
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Speech at the London School of Economics with the title "Old friends, new beginnings - building another future for the EU-UK partnership" followed by Q&A.
#brexitnews
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