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Radek Sikorski, Poland’s minister of foreign affairs, has thanked Britain for Brexit, saying Europe is stronger for it.
Writing in The Spectator ahead of the British election, Sikorski pointed to the failed minister for “Brexit opportunities” role created under the Boris Johnson administration but ditched since, saying he would point to three successes of note.
Jacob Rees-Mogg, who held the position for a short while, was one of several casualties in the general election on Thursday, alongside former prime minister Liz Truss and the self-titled “hardman of Brexit”, Steve Baker.
Sikorski said that if he was tasked with finding the benefits of Brexit he would credit the outgoing regime on at least three counts.
“First, thanks to Brexit, the EU at last has the wonderfully named European Peace Facility – an EU defence budget, of course – which the UK consistently vetoed. Most of its €7 billion has been allocated to arms for Ukraine although disbursement is still being vetoed by Hungary.
“Second, Brexit has finally settled the argument as to whether member states lose sovereignty. I was born in communist Poland: if we had tried to leave the Warsaw Pact, as Imre Nagy did in 1956, we would have been invaded by Soviet tanks. That’s what lack of sovereignty looks like. Britain, on the other hand, left the EU by its own decision and nobody tried to stop you. You were sovereign all along.
“Third, there used to be more than a million Poles in the UK, but the latest estimate is around 700,000. Higher wages in Norway, Germany and even Poland (our average pay is now €2,000 per month) are probably the main factor, but Brexit surely contributed. In practice, Brexit abolished privileges for EU citizens and brought their legal status in the UK down to the level of other foreigners. As a result, you get fewer migrants from Europe and more from the rest of the world. Good! We want our Poles back.”
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