British business leaders have slammed a rumored plan for a closer Swiss-style relationship with the European Union (EU).
Confederation of British Industry (CBI) director-general Tony Danker attacked the mooted scheme ahead of the bosses' club's conference in Birmingham on Monday, where Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was due to speak.
The rumor of a deal for closer cooperation with the EU emerged in a report in a British Sunday newspaper. It has since been denied by at least two government ministers.
"I’m a bit puzzled about the whole Swiss thing," Danker told a radio programme, adding: "It took them about 40 years to get to the Swiss arrangement."
Switzerland's relationship with the bloc is regulated by more than 100 bilateral agreements with the EU and its predecessor the European Community, starting with a free trade deal in 1972.
Danker also gave a surprisingly strong endorsement of former PM Boris Johnson's EU withdrawal agreement from 2020 — given that the CBI was one of the fiercest opponents of Brexit even after 17 million Britons backed it in the 2016 referendum.
"Currently, we’re not even implementing Boris’s deal," he said. "Let’s implement Boris’s Brexit deal, that still has some growth in it, by the way, that’s all come to a freeze, and let’s forget the discussion about Switzerland for now."
He blamed problems with implementing the 2020 agreement on the impasse over the controversial Northern Ireland Protocol, which has kept the exclave in the EU's Common Market with customs barriers impeding trade with the mainland.
"We’ve got we’ve got an impasse because of the Northern Ireland protocol," Danker said. "There’s lots of freezing of our science relationships, of our recognition of our qualifications, of easier travel across Europe. Those things will give us some growth. But it needs the Europeans and the British government to get round the table and solve the protocol."
Responding to a journalists' question at the CBI conference — where some employers called for immigration rules from the EU to be relaxed, Sunak
"Let me be unequivocal about this: under my leadership the UK will not pursue any relationship with Europe that relies on alignment with EU laws," The PM said. "I voted for Brexit, I believe in Brexit, and I know Brexit can deliver and is already delivering enormous benefits and opportunities."
The source of the rumour reported on Sunday was unclear, but may have originated with an interview given by new Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt on Friday, where he said he wanted "unfettered trade" with the EU.
Hunt, the leader of the ruling Conservative Party's Europhile faction, was brought back into government in September by short-lived PM Liz Truss after her programme of tax cuts and subsidies for soaring energy bills hit opposition from the City of London.
While there was no official denial of the report before it went to press, ministers have since denied it has any substance.
In a TV interview on Sunday, Health Secretary Steve Barclay said he did not support a 'Swiss-style' arrangement, stressing: "I don't recognise this story at all.”
On Monday morning Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick also scotched the reports.
"We have a settled position on our relationship with the European Union, that’s the deal that was struck in 2019 and 2020 — and that’s the one that we intend to stick to," Jenrick said. "That sets out the fundamental position that we don’t want to see a return to free movement, we don’t want to have the jurisdiction of European judges in the UK, and we don’t want to be paying any money to the European Union."