How a new Labour government could change British foreign policy

Semaphore Signals: A global look at the most important events of the day.

Starmer will continue to support Ukraine through UK, but the country could lag behind on defence spending

Political, The Times in London

Britain’s new defence secretary has promised to honour a long-standing agreement on military aid to Ukraine, and Starmer is likely to reassure his NATO counterparts of the UK’s broader commitment to the country, a senior EU official told Politico. However, Labour’s fiscal rules mean there is no date yet for increasing Britain’s defence spending on NATO from 2% of GDP to 2.5%, the outlet noted, which has become an even more contentious point in the wake of Russia’s deadliest airstrikes in months on Ukraine. A former British army chief told the Times of London that the figure needed to be “closer to 3 per cent”.

The UK also has something to offer the EU

Britain in a Changing Europe, Centre for European Reform

The European Political Community, which Starmer is set to host, is a forum more suited to symbolism and tone-setting than to concrete outcomes, two experts from the UK in a Changing Europe think tank argued. But Labour “should not be put off” by EU officials’ often cool attitudes towards improving Britain’s trade relations with the bloc, argued Charles Grant, director of the Centre for European Reform. While some in the EU will inevitably accuse Starmer of “cherry-picking” access to the single market, which he has ruled out rejoining, the reality is that the EU “wants to pick a few of its own cherries” in the form of UK fisheries and youth mobility schemes, Grant added.

Labour’s approach to China should avoid stabilisation, expert says

the foreign policy, South China Morning Post, Chatham House

Starmer has promised to conduct an “audit” of Britain’s China policy within 100 days, but it would be “unrealistic” to frame his approach to Beijing in terms of stabilising relations, a Foreign Policy columnist has argued. Middle powers like the UK cannot solve major geopolitical issues such as Taiwan or China’s support for Russia on their own, he wrote, but the UK and China could find other areas of cooperation, particularly on artificial intelligence governance, climate and the digital economy, one expert told the South China Morning Post. The UK government must recognise that Beijing’s diplomacy is based on a “convergence of interests” rather than shared values like those of the UK and the US, an Asia expert on behalf of Chatham House has argued.