David Cameron has said the “heat and anger” has gone from the UK-EU relationship, as he spoke at length about the UK’s global position after Brexit for the first time since becoming foreign secretary.
Cameron told peers on the Lords European affairs committee that relations between London and Brussels were better than they had been for some time, in part thanks to the Windsor framework agreed by the prime minister, Rishi Sunak.
Cameron’s comments mark his most detailed assessment yet of Britain’s place in the world since he quit as prime minister in 2016, and contrast with predictions he made during the Brexit campaign, when he warned leaving the EU would involve “walking away from the world”.
“A lot of the heat and anger has come out of the relationship,” he told members of the committee. “It is now a lot more functional, and I think it’s functioning well.”
He added: “We have decided not to be a member, but we can be friends, neighbours and partners. We make that partnership work as well as we can.”
Cameron was keen not to criticise the UK’s departure from the EU during his first committee hearing since Sunak appointed him foreign secretary last month, despite having led the campaign to prevent it seven years ago.
He spoke about the benefits of Brexit, which he said enabled Britain to be “big enough to matter, but small enough to be nimble”. One of those benefits, he said, was the ability to enter trade pacts such as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership with Canada, Japan and nine other countries.
“There is no point in leaving and not taking advantage of leaving,” he said.
Cameron warned however against the risk of diverging too far from European standards, which could cut Britain off from access to continental markets.
“Let’s not diverge for the sake of it,” he said, talking specifically about the need to maintain strict enough data protection controls to be able to trade with the EU. “But if there are things we can do that lessen bureaucracy, help business, that help our entrepreneurs, let’s do those things.”
Cameron also urged US and EU politicians to pass new packages of support to Ukraine, warning that failing to do so would constitute a “Christmas present to Vladimir Putin”.
Republicans in Congress are blocking a $61bn military aid package to Ukraine while they demand concessions on immigration policy, while the Hungarian prime minister, Viktor Orbán, is standing in the way of a European support plan in Brussels.
“The best Christmas present we could give to the Ukrainians is to pass both those packages,” Cameron said.
Cameron announced on Thursday that the UK would ban “extremist” Israeli settlers from entering the UK, calling the recent bouts of settler violence against Palestinian civilians on the West Bank “unacceptable”.
He later told the committee he continued to support a two-state solution, despite the recent comments by Tzipi Hotovely, the Israeli ambassador to the UK, arguing against a Palestinian state. Asked by Sky News this week whether there could be a two-state solution in the Middle East, Hotovely replied: “The answer is absolutely no.”
Cameron called Hotovely’s comments “disappointing”, in some of the most direct criticism aimed by a British politician at one of their Israeli counterparts since the war started in October. But he added that he remained committed to the idea of a free Palestine alongside a secure Israel.
“Ultimately, if you want there to be security and stability for Israel … long-term security requites there to be a state for Palestine as well.”
