France wants to scrap the one in, one out deal and replace it with a scheme under which Britain would take asylum seekers from anywhere in the entire EU. Yes, the entire EU…
Laurent Nuñez, the French interior minister, reportedly told Shabana Mahmood as much, having said at a French parliamentary inquiry in June that the pilot signed in August 2025 was never meant to run past 1st October this year, and that France “should not have to carry it alone“.
Burnham pleaded with Macron to keep the current deal going at Downing Street last week. Even if Macron is more sympathetic than his interior minister, there’s a presidential election looming next year anyway…
Former Treasury minister and adviser to Burnham in the Makerfield campaign Lord Jim O’Neill, who has turned down a role in his government, said Burnham’s first statement Commons was:
“The last thing investors wanted to hear… gilt yields have risen by a 0.25% in one day, which is a lot. We’ve not had that since Liz Truss days… If your country is under the focus of ‘can they come up with a sensible fiscal strategy’ on a day when the markets think ‘well no, you’re not showing any sign of it’ you’re going to have a tough day…if it stays like this your mortgage rate is going up.”