Keir Starmer will hand the EU more than £8bn, and let in 100,000 people a year, as part of a closer alignment with Brussels.
Starmer struck a deal with the EU (Image: Getty)
Sir Keir Starmer has lumped the UK with an £8.75 billion bill after he agreed to rejoin the European Union’s Erasmus scheme.
Whitehall announced Wednesday [17 December 2025] that Britain would head back into the EU’s expensive student exchange program, which allows students to spend a year studying at a European University, in what marks a major step toward EU re-integration.
The move comes just weeks after Sir Keir, who supported, campaigned for, and voted for remain, announced he was prepared to make “trade offs” as part of his push for closer ties with Brussels.
Labour have done other deals with the EU, such as handing them access to British fishing waters, and promising to follow Brussels-set standards on food exports.
Rejoining Erasmus will cost £570 million in 2027 for a single year of membership. The UK taxpayer previously footed a bill of around £300 million to be in the last five years of its previous membership to the scheme.
And now it has been estimated by Labour that 100,000 Europeans could enter the country by 2027 using Erasmus.
This week, Sarah Jone, a Labours minister, could not promise that Labour would cap the number of students coming in. She told Times Radio she could not “get ahead of any negotiations before they’ve been completed or announced, I’m afraid.”
It was reported in the Telegraph the ongoing membership of the scheme could cost the UK more, with the EU intending to increase funding for the scheme to €41 billion in 2028, up from €21 billion.
This could reportedly see Britain paying £1.25 a year between 2028 and 2034.
A European Commission official said: “The terms of UK association to any successor programme to Erasmus will be subject to a separate negotiation.”
Lord Frost, the UK’s former Brexit negotiator, told The Telegraph: “The Government has done what it always does – make a concession up front and sort out the consequences later.
“They pay an inflated amount to get back into Erasmus for one year, they won’t then want to leave again, so they will end up paying whatever the EU wants for the next seven years. The truth is, of course, they just want to be liked by the EU and don’t care what price they have to pay.”
The news follows long-standing accusations that the Prime Minister, an ardent remainer, is trying to drag the country back into the EU in secret.
Just this month, the Deputy Prime Minister, David Lammy, refused on seven occasions to rule out rejoining the customs union.
Sir Keir himself has also described using Brexit to inform foreign policy as “utterly reckless” and promised a “closer relationship” with the trading bloc the UK voted to leave by the end of his first term.
