LONDON — U.K. Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has been warned her planned overhaul of settlement rules for migrants will not save the £10 billion she has claimed. Instead, the policy to drastically increase the length of time migrants must wait before gaining permanent residency could end up costing the Treasury billions, according to a private briefing note shared with the Home Office and obtained by POLITICO.  The document, drawn up by the IPPR think tank where Mahmood made the case for her reforms earlier this month, is being used by Labour MPs to pressure for a rethink of the policy. A leading critic said it totally “dismantles” her financial argument. In her speech, Mahmood cited increased welfare costs from the 196,000 migrants on health and social care visas and their dependents who arrived during a post-Brexit immigration spike, and who are expected to start getting settled status soon, as a key reason for the overhaul.  Under her proposals, care workers would have to wait around 15 years before being eligible for indefinite leave to remain (ILR), up from the current five years.  “If we do not, we will see a £10 billion pound drain on our public finances and further strain on public services, like housing and healthcare, already under immense pressure,” Mahmood said. But the progressive think tank, which is well-connected in Labour circles, argues the Home Office’s calculations are flawed for four reasons.  The department’s figure is based on the cost of welfare spending over the individuals’ lifetimes. But the IPPR points out that estimates from the government’s own Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) show dependents making net positive financial contributions until they stop working, claim the state pension and start having higher health costs. Though Mahmood’s proposals will lengthen the time it takes them to gain access to the welfare system, the change “will not make a significant difference to the lifetime fiscal impact” of these migrants, according to the report. “The only way this policy would significantly bring down the £10 billion lifetime fiscal cost is if it led to large numbers of care workers and dependents leaving the U.K. before they reached the qualifying period for settlement,” the IPPR says. As it stands, that’s not the case Mahmood is making. The primary reason care workers make a negative net lifetime financial contribution is because they are poorly paid. Gaining settlement would allow them to earn more by opening the door to work in any occupation. But delaying this traps them in lower-paid work for longer, the document argues. “The overall fiscal impact of the proposed earned settlement reforms should therefore consider the potential costs of lower tax contributions from the care worker cohort while they wait for settlement, as well as the fiscal benefits of restricting access to public funds for longer,” the IPPR says. If indeed the policy is to encourage care workers and their dependents to leave the U.K. in large numbers then the briefing argues it could in fact add to costs.  Estimates by the MAC, which advises the Home Office, point out that their adult dependents are net positive contributors for 20 — and it’s only after around 40 years that they make a cumulative net negative financial impact to the British state. “Given the [Treasury’s] fiscal rules work to a 5-year horizon, the emigration of care workers would make it harder — not easier — for the Treasury to meet its fiscal targets,” the IPPR argues. ‘DISMANTLES THE RATIONALE’ The briefing also digs into the wider “earned settlement” policy. Estimates of the effects are hard to ascertain because behavioral impacts are uncertain. But last year’s immigration white paper was accompanied by an illustrative example of a drop of between 10-20 per cent in skilled workers, care workers and their dependents. The IPPR uses this to calculate the cost to the Treasury based on that reduction being applied to both care workers and skilled workers. They argue that this would mean a potential cost to the exchequer of £11 billion to £22 billion over the lifetimes of migrants granted relevant visas last year.  “Even if the policy is designed in such a way to minimise any direct effects on skilled workers who make a positive fiscal contribution, it is possible that the reforms will deter (and indeed may already be deterring) higher-paid workers who seek certainty for their and their family’s status,” it says. “Even a small impact on higher-paid skilled workers would counteract the savings from care workers, given the per person net lifetime fiscal contribution of skilled workers is £689,000, nearly 20 times larger than the per person net costs of care workers.”  Leading Labour critic of the policy Tony Vaughan used the findings to argue that Mahmood’s proposals “will be a fiscal cost to the U.K. for decades.” “The IPPR report dismantles the rationale for this earned settlement policy,” the MP told POLITICO. “It would also undermine community cohesion and integration, weakening the bonds that hold our society together. This is not a policy that can be trimmed around the edges. It is fundamentally flawed and should be abandoned.” POLITICO reported this week that the government is considering watering down the proposals, potentially introducing transitions to ease the retrospective nature of the changes that are proving most controversial among Labour MPs. But, as critics consider parliamentary action to force a vote on the issue, Vaughan indicated the compromises under consideration would not be enough.  “I say that as a loyal Labour MP who has never voted against the government and who desperately wants us to succeed, but cannot in good conscience stand by and see a policy as flawed as this, which is so strongly against our national interest, reach the statute books,” he said. The Home Office has yet to respond to a request for comment.

Germany’s Friedrich Merz and Poland’s Donald Tusk are among a group of EU leaders urging Brussels to tighten visa rules for Russian nationals with combat experience in Ukraine. In a letter to European Council President António Costa and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, eight leaders warned that Moscow’s war on Ukraine is creating longer-term internal security risks for the EU’s Schengen free-movement area. They argue that demobilized or rotating combatants, including thousands recruited from prisons, could seek to travel to EU countries, potentially fueling organized crime, violent offences or hostile state activity. They say rising numbers of visas issued to Russian nationals add urgency to the issue. Russian nationals filed some 620,000 to 670,000 Schengen visa applications in 2025, according to travel-industry estimates, ranking among the top five nationalities seeking entry to the EU. Roughly four in five applicants received a visa. “Any entry may therefore have serious consequences for the security of a Member State or the entire Schengen area,” the letter states. The initiative, also backed by Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Sweden, calls on the Commission to prepare targeted visa restrictions and explore changes to EU rules enabling coordinated entry bans. EU countries have already tightened access in recent years, with most visas now issued for shorter stays and more limited validity.

Reform UK’s Welsh leader has ruled out moving to an insurance-based healthcare system, despite the party’s U.K.-wide boss Nigel Farage keeping the idea on the table. Dan Thomas, who took charge of Farage’s populist right-wing party in Wales last month, said he would not consider “any kind of insurance-based” reform to Britain’s National Health Service (NHS). Thomas spoke to POLITICO for a special feature and Westminster Insider podcast on the battle for the Welsh parliament, the Senedd, on May 7. Both will be released on Friday. His position differs from that of Farage, who leads the insurgent party across the U.K. It is an early sign of the challenge that faces Farage — who has long had a presidential-like hold on his parties — in reconciling the messaging from Reform’s growing network of office-holders. While a Reform spokesperson told POLITICO it would keep the NHS free at the point of use for British citizens, Farage has not ruled out other reforms, such as moving funding of the NHS from general taxation to an insurance system. Asked at the party’s Welsh manifesto launch on Mar. 5 if he would be prepared to look at reforms such as a French-style insurance system (in which citizens have mandatory insurance and pay through social security contributions), Farage said: “That would be a national decision ahead of a general election.”  He added: “On the big U.K. picture of health, I’m prepared to consider any alternative to the failure we’ve got now … as for devolved powers, I’ll let Dan speak to that.” Thomas later said he would not support moving to an insurance-based system in Wales. “No, no,” he said in an interview. “We rule out any kind of insurance system or any kind of privatization.  “It will be free at the point of use. That’s what the public in Wales wants, and that’s what we will deliver.”  Asked if he disagreed with Farage’s remarks on an insurance model, Thomas replied: “Look, Nigel’s also said that devolved issues are down to the Welsh party, and I wouldn’t consider any kind of insurance-based or private-based system for the Welsh NHS.  “I think we can improve the NHS in Wales within the existing £14 billion budget, and it just takes focus. We [also] need more ministerial authority and intervention when services aren’t delivering.” A WELSH TEST Polls predict Reform (as well as Welsh nationalist party Plaid Cymru) will surge ahead of the Labour incumbents in elections to the Senedd on May 7. “We rule out any kind of insurance system or any kind of privatization,” said Dan Thomas. | Jon Rowly/Getty Images The future of the NHS is a key attack line in the campaign for the center-left Labour and left-wing Plaid Cymru, who accuse Reform of flirting with privatization. Reform said in its 2024 general election manifesto that NHS services “will always be free at the point of use,” though not for foreign citizens. In November, the party announced plans to raise the existing “health surcharge” for visa applicants from £1,035 to £2,718 per year. A Reform UK spokesperson said Wednesday: “We will always keep the NHS free at the point of use for British citizens.” The comments from Thomas and Farage appear to raise the prospect that Reform UK could consider one funding model for England and another for Wales. Mark Dayan, a policy analyst at the Nuffield Trust, a nonpartisan health think tank, said this would technically be possible, but changing the model at any level would be a major upheaval. “It would certainly be possible for Wales and England to have different approaches to coverage and user charges, because health is already a devolved issue,” Dayan said. “Wales already has some separate user charging policies around prescriptions, for example. “The taxation side of it will be really complicated … you’d be taking a lot of money out of some taxes and piling it into payroll taxes to make it social insurance. So you’d have to rewire things quite a bit, and some of that would probably require you to redesign how money goes from Westminster to the other U.K. countries, whether or not they had social insurance as well.”

LONDON — The British government should stop being “unnecessarily secretive” about its plans for closer relations with the European Union and be much clearer about what it wants, the chair of the U.K. parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee said. In a report released on Wednesday, the cross-party committee of lawmakers urged ministers to publish a white paper outlining what they want the eventual relationship with the EU — billed as a Brexit “reset” — to look like. The Labour government should, they argued, “clarify” whether it is reconsidering its election manifesto red lines on trying to rejoin the bloc’s single market and customs union — and whether “it can envisage any circumstances in which it would be prudent to do so.” “We do feel that the government is being unnecessarily secretive about it all and isn’t sufficiently clear about what it is that it’s doing and why — which we think is unfortunate,” Emily Thornberry told POLITICO in an interview timed with the report’s launch. Thornberry, the veteran Labour MP for Islington South, whose constituency neighbors that of Prime Minister Keir Starmer, said she understood why the government had been “nervous” when starting talks with Brussels, but said it should now be more ambitious and open. “The truth is that the public have just sort of shrugged their shoulders and said, well, yeah, get on with it,” the committee chair said. “And so I think that it has been incumbent on the government to be more ambitious, to go further, and to be clearer about what it is that we want. Because it’s quite clear what the Europeans want, and that there are times when it is not necessarily as clear about what it is that we want to achieve.” Starmer last year struck a deal in principle with the EU that opened talks on a spread of agreements covering trade in agri-food, electricity interconnections, carbon markets, and visas for young people. Negotiations on the topics are currently ongoing, with most of the files expected to be completed by the summer. But the prime minister and his finance chief Rachel Reeves have since hinted that they want to go further and align the U.K. with the EU single market in other areas — while ruling out joining the EU customs union. The government is yet to say exactly which sectors it would prioritize, however — and Starmer has said he wants the U.K.-EU relationship to be “iterative” with new cooperation added on an annual basis at regular summits. SCRUTINY The new report also calls for the re-establishment of a dedicated European Scrutiny Committee in the House of Commons, to oversee the Brexit reset and Britain’s wider relationship with the continent. A version of the specialized EU affairs committee had existed since 1972, but it was disestablished by Starmer’s new government in 2024 — with responsibility for the topic passing to Thornberry’s Foreign Affairs Committee, as well as a group of unelected lawmakers in the House of Lords. Thornberry told POLITICO: “The truth is that there are only 11 of us … we had, at one stage, ten reports open, which sounds ridiculous, but then you think about the state of the world, and you think, well, yeah, of course. “We haven’t properly done a study into China yet. And how can we not have done an inquiry into China? The reason is because you just can’t do everything, although we are trying. So I think in order to give our developing relationship with the European Union the scrutiny that it definitely deserves, we do think that there needs to be another team working on it.” A U.K. government spokesperson said: “Our priorities are clear: working in the national interest to deliver a strategic shift in our relationship with the EU through improved diplomatic, economic, and security cooperation. “This includes securing a landmark food and drink trade deal and the carbon linking agreement by the next UK-EU Summit that will add £9 billion a year to the UK economy. “We are stripping away the costly bureaucracy and red tape that acts as a drag on growth, backing British jobs and putting more money in people’s pockets across the country.”

Iran was the first team to qualify for the 2026 World Cup. But when FIFA convened a planning meeting for participating nations this week in Atlanta, Iran was the one country missing. That absence has fueled questions about whether Tehran will send a team to the United States for this summer’s tournament amid a potentially escalating regional war, and whether the U.S. government would allow Iranian officials to enter the country if it does. “I really don’t care,” if Iran participates, President Donald Trump told POLITICO in an exclusive interview on Tuesday morning. “I think Iran is a very badly defeated country. They’re running on fumes.” Soccer governing body FIFA, which declined to not comment, has long tried to keep geopolitics from overshadowing the World Cup, which will be spread across North America’s three largest countries. But with a war underway in which one tournament host has attacked a participant, which in turn launched strikes on other competing nations, the prospect of Iranian players — and potentially government-linked officials — traveling to the U.S. is fast becoming one of the sports world’s most sensitive flash points. Iran is currently scheduled to play New Zealand in Los Angeles on June 15, Belgium in Los Angeles on June 21 and Egypt in Seattle on June 26. If both the U.S. and Iran finish second in their respective groups, the two countries could face off in a July 3 elimination match in Dallas. After U.S. and Israeli airstrikes inside Iran plunged the region into open conflict, Iran’s top soccer official said his country might not send a team to the tournament. “What is certain is that after this attack, we cannot be expected to look forward to the World Cup with hope,” Iranian soccer federation President Mehdi Taj told the Iranian sports outlet Varzesh3 following the strikes. Even before the military conflict began, questions about whether Iranian fans and dignitaries would be allowed to attend swirled around tournament preparations. Iran is one of two competing nations covered under Trump’s most restrictive travel ban, which was enacted by executive order last June. The ban specifically carves out World Cup teams and support personnel from the ban, but leaves decisions about whether to grant or deny visa exceptions to others — including government figures or executives from team-sponsoring companies — for the State Department to consider on a case-by-case basis. Soccer governing body FIFA, which declined to not comment, has long tried to keep geopolitics from overshadowing the World Cup, which will be spread across North America’s three largest countries. But with a war underway in which one tournament host has attacked a participant, which in turn launched strikes on other competing nations, the prospect of Iranian players — and potentially government-linked officials — traveling to the U.S. is fast becoming one of the sports world’s most sensitive flash points. Iran is currently scheduled to play New Zealand in Los Angeles on June 15, Belgium in Los Angeles on June 21 and Egypt in Seattle on June 26. If both the U.S. and Iran finish second in their respective groups, the two countries could face off in a July 3 elimination match in Dallas. After U.S. and Israeli airstrikes inside Iran plunged the region into open conflict, Iran’s top soccer official said his country might not send a team to the tournament. “What is certain is that after this attack, we cannot be expected to look forward to the World Cup with hope,” Iranian soccer federation President Mehdi Taj told the Iranian sports outlet Varzesh3 following the strikes. Even before the military conflict began, questions about whether Iranian fans and dignitaries would be allowed to attend swirled around tournament preparations. Iran is one of two competing nations covered under Trump’s most restrictive travel ban, which was enacted by executive order last June. The ban specifically carves out World Cup teams and support personnel from the ban, but leaves decisions about whether to grant or deny visa exceptions to others — including government figures or executives from team-sponsoring companies — for the State Department to consider on a case-by-case basis. In December, the State Department did not approve all visa applications for Iranian representatives planning to attend the World Cup draw in Washington. Iran subsequently threatened to boycott the ceremony, prompting FIFA to step in and mediate the dispute, according to people familiar with the episode. The three-day event hosted by FIFA in Atlanta this week included a series of meetings and workshops for national federations that will compete in the tournament. Individual sessions covered issues related to team medicine, facilities, match organization and commercial matters, according to a copy of the agenda obtained by POLITICO. Representatives from soccer federations worldwide from all over the world participated in the planning workshops but Iran was absent, according to two people familiar with the gathering granted anonymity to discuss it. The White House FIFA World Cup Task Force, which coordinates closely with Cabinet agencies on tournament planning, for months has been closely tracking the geopolitical complexities that are likely to impact the tournament. The task force’s director, Andrew Giuliani, said in a January interview in Colorado Springs that security concerns would drive the administration’s decisions about what kinds of exceptions it would make to the travel ban. “We want this to be a safe and secure World Cup,” Giuliani said. “So yeah, of course, we want the teams to be here and to play, but we also understand that most fan bases are going to come here to enjoy an incredible World Cup, to add to the experience. But it’d be foolish, in understanding what Iran is going through right now, to expect that we would just open our borders.” Giuliani told POLITICO on Tuesday that “President Trump’s decisive action to eliminate the Ayatollah, the most notorious state sponsor of terrorism in my lifetime, removes a major destabilizing threat and will help protect people around the world, including Americans and the millions planning to attend the 2026 World Cup in the United States.”

The president of Iran’s soccer federation said Sunday the nation’s participation in this summer’s FIFA World Cup in North America is in doubt after the U.S.-Israeli airstrikes in Iran plunged the country into war. “What is certain is that after this attack, we cannot be expected to look forward to the World Cup with hope,” Mehdi Taj, head of Iranian soccer’s governing body, told sports news outlet Varzesh3 following the airstrikes. Uncertainty around Iran’s future is growing as the country sustains a second day of airstrikes after Saturday’s attacks led to the deaths of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and several other Iranian senior officials. President Donald Trump, who received the inaugural FIFA Peace Prize last year ahead of the U.S. co-hosting this summer’s World Cup, said Sunday he expects fighting in Iran to continue for potentially four more weeks. FIFA secretary general Mattias Grafström said the organization remains committed to facilitating all qualified teams’ participation in the tournament this summer. “I read the news the same way as you did this morning … Our focus is to have a safe World Cup with everybody participating,” Grafstrom said during a press conference in Cymru, Wales, on Saturday. Uncertainty around the future of Iran’s leadership complicates existing tensions between the Trump administration and Iran’s World Cup delegation. The State Department did not approve all visa applications for representatives from Iran who planned to travel to Washington in December for the World Cup draw. In response, Iran threatened to boycott the ceremony, forcing FIFA to mediate the disagreement. Fans who are Iranian nationals will have difficulty traveling to the U.S. for the World Cup following a travel ban imposed by the Trump administration last year on people from 19 countries, including Iran. Andrew Giuliani, head of the White House’s World Cup task force, praised Trump for taking action against Iran while downplaying the consequences the strikes may have on the tournament. “My heart is with the thousands of American service members’ families who were victims of the Ayatollah’s ‘Death to America’ mission. The head of the snake spreading that vile message has now been cut off, and I pray the Iranian people will seize their liberty,” Giuliani wrote Saturday on social media. “We’ll deal with soccer games tomorrow–tonight, we celebrate their opportunity for freedom.” Iran is scheduled to play its first two games against New Zealand and Belgium in Los Angeles, before travelling to Seattle for a match against Egypt. Sophia Cai contributed to this report.

LONDON — Global Counsel started the year riding high. The public affairs agency had just posted its best-ever financial results, could boast of staff in multiple countries, and was in the process of expanding its international operations. In a matter of weeks, the lobby shop’s 16-year legacy had been all-but wiped out, and it had collapsed into administration under the weight of the Epstein scandal. Co-founder Peter Mandelson, the former U.K. ambassador to Washington and one of the commanding figures of British politics over the past four decades, is facing fresh revelations over his links to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Despite frantic efforts to distance itself from Mandelson, the influence business he masterminded was forced to fold. POLITICO spoke to more than half a dozen members of staff and former clients since the agency announced it was going into administration last Thursday. They paint a picture of a dramatic and sudden disintegration which left more than 100 staffers in London, Brussels and Washington scrambling to find new jobs. Many were granted anonymity to speak openly about their experience. NEVER SEEN HIM Staff insist Mandelson — who founded Global Counsel in 2010 after Labour lost power — had very little to do with the firm when the latest documents on his contact with Epstein dropped at the end of January. Among them were emails suggesting Mandelson leaked sensitive information to Epstein when serving as business secretary. He is now subject to a police investigation. Mandelson’s lawyers Mishcon de Reya say he is cooperating with the police investigation, and his overriding priority is to “clear his name.” “There was a feeling of bewilderment initially because it seemed blindingly obvious to us that [Mandelson] was out of the picture,” a senior staff member said. “But the reporting, or maybe more the response from people to the reporting, made it sound like he was still sitting in on pitches and approving our expenses.” The former Labour heavyweight’s association with the firm had long been seen as a major asset — particularly as Labour’s Keir Starmer prepared for power, backed by Mandelson ally Morgan McSweeney. But Mandelson formally stepped back from any day-to-day involvement with Global Counsel when he became U.K. ambassador to Washington in December 2024. When he was sacked from the post by Starmer last September over previous revelations about his links to Epstein, the firm announced his 21 percent stake would be sold. He would be barred from drawing financial benefits, and his shares would be reclassified so he would no longer have a say over business decisions. But the senior staff member quoted above said a failure to complete the divestment process quickly, given the complex legal and financial process involved, meant it was “impossible to argue there was clear blue water” from Mandelson. Mandelson was sacked from the ambassador post by Keir Starmer last September over previous revelations about his links to Epstein. | Rick Friedman/Corbis via Getty Images This was particularly frustrating for staff members who said they had never seen Mandelson in the flesh. Even those with years of service said he had only been present a handful of times. ‘BLOWN OUT OF PROPORTION’ Matters were also complicated by the appearance of Global Counsel co-founder Benjamin Wegg-Prosser — then still the company’s chief executive —in the Epstein emails released by the U.S. Department of Justice. He was copied into conversations about the business between Mandelson and Epstein, and directly emailed Epstein with a draft statement the company had prepared seeking to downplay links between Mandelson and the convicted sex offender. Global Counsel was approached for comment about the Wegg-Prosser emails at the time they were released, but they declined to comment. POLITICO was unable to reach Wegg-Prosser for comment ahead of the publication of this article. Wegg-Prosser’s involvement was simply “one of those circumstances where you’re asked to do something by your chairman and you do that,” a Global Counsel director said. His role, they argued, had been “blown significantly out of proportion” by media reporting. “Anyone that works in public affairs will know that a meeting is a meeting, and you’re never always going to know who that person is.” In an attempt to put a lid on the growing crisis, Wegg-Prosser announced his departure from Global Counsel on Feb. 6, just hours before the firm confirmed it had finally completed the divestment of Mandelson’s shares. But it wasn’t enough. An associate director of the agency said Wegg-Prosser’s exit came as a “real shock” to staff, and argued that his links had been “seriously overblown” by the media. Wegg-Prosser’s “principled” decision to step down, they suggested, may have instead “perversely” fueled an erroneous impression that the links between Epstein and the firm were deeper than the reality. NOT JUST HEADLINES Staff initially hoped the Mandelson backlash would be limited to a series of gruesome headlines. But those hopes were dashed when a host of household names — including Tesco, Bank of America and Barclays — called time on their relationship with the firm. Some major clients did stick by the embattled agency, including banking giant Santander. Samir Dwesar, the bank’s senior public affairs and public policy manager told POLITICO the staff “don’t deserve this,” but predicted the “consummate professionals, who have deep expertise in their areas” would “all be snapped up pretty quickly.” Another public affairs professional at a company which employed Global Counsel said there had been “no discussions” about ending their contract. “Our assessment was that Global Counsel’s leadership had taken the correct decisions under incredibly difficult circumstances,” they said. “We were confident they’d get through it.” Many staff believed the same when they gathered for the all-hands meeting at the firm’s London HQ last Thursday — only to be told that not only was Global Counsel to close, but that administrators had been appointed to oversee the company’s affairs. A note to staff from Chief Executive Rebecca Park said “the decision to wind up the UK business affects all of GC. We will be discussing separately with each country office how the process will work for them.” Staff present for the London HQ announcement soon decamped to local bars to digest the news and drown their sorrows. | Daniel Sorabji/AFP via Getty Images “I think for a lot of people, it was a shock,” the same director at the firm quoted above said. “We’d amazingly retained a significant number of clients. In terms of business, that’s not easy, particularly when you’re politically exposed. So I think there should be a big thanks to them and the loyalty they showed as well.” The associate director quoted above said staff had sought solace in the survival of  business lobby group the Confederation of British Industry, which weathered its own storm of sexual misconduct claims. A mass exodus of members, and the icing of Whitehall meetings by government ministers wary of association with the group, was overcome under new leadership. “Maybe I was naïve, but lots of business leaders and politicians are brought down by scandals that leave their companies or parties bruised, and they still survive,” the associate director quoted above said. “I’d started to believe that might be the case with us too.” Staff present for the London HQ announcement soon decamped to local bars to digest the news and drown their sorrows. Some who had dialed in from half-term holidays had to return to their families knowing they’d just lost their livelihoods. Everyone — from decade-long veterans to new joiners — was affected. There remains a sense of genuine anger and grief among staff, who say their time at Global Counsel was among the most rewarding of their careers. While some had begrudgingly started job-hunting when the scandal first broke, others had opted to stay given a belief that the firm was entirely disconnected from Mandelson’s historic behavior. “I spent the weekend speaking to my partner, my parents, and my closest friends about what to do,” the associate director quoted above said of the days after the scandal broke. “I looked through some of the emails [in the Epstein files] and felt physically nauseous. I didn’t want to have even a microscopic link to what I was reading about, but at the same time I didn’t see that reflected whatsoever in the culture or people at Global Counsel.” The lingering question for many is whether the collapse could have been prevented. The failure to divest Mandelson’s shares left a tangible legal link, but a second associate director said frequent references to Mandelson in Global Counsel media coverage meant people outside the operation saw him as “central to its DNA” — even if that was not the experience of those working there. NEW HORIZONS Park, who stepped up as CEO following Wegg-Prosser’s departure, was praised by some of the staff for how she handled the final days of the crisis. Staff POLITICO spoke to highlighted efforts she had overseen to try and secure new jobs for those out of work. There is even more urgency to find a new job for those staff whose visas are linked to their work at the firm. Under U.K. laws they will have just 60 days to find new employment or face having their visas revoked. It has left some Global Counsel staff at risk of losing their immigration status, along with family members listed as their dependents. One staff member left in that situation said the change to their visa status meant they are no longer entitled to unemployment benefits or other public funds. With the firm entering into the administration process, other staff also lost access to enhanced parental pay packages. Despite initial fears that staff at the agency would be stained by their association, several of those who spoke to POLITICO have already secured new jobs. One staff member at rival firm FGS Global said it the lobbying agency is planning a hiring spree, with as many as two dozen ex-Global Counsel staff being lined up for new gigs. Those are expected to include a raft of senior staffers who’d been working on financial services and private equity briefs. “I think people do recognize that this is an insane opportunity from a talent perspective, just given how [Global Counsel] was respected and the people that were there, I think they genuinely are recognized as top of the class in the field,” the ex-Global Counsel director quoted above said. This reporting first appeared in POLITICO London Influence, a weekly newsletter on lobbying, campaigning and influence in Westminster and beyond.

BRUSSELS — After years of looking at Turkey as a problem, the European Union is now viewing it as part of the solution. As negotiations for peace in Ukraine gather momentum, Turkey’s potential role in the post-war order — particularly as a peacekeeper and regional powerbroker in the Black Sea —makes it a critical partner for the EU. However, Brussels is taking baby steps with a country that has been backsliding on democracy and whose Islamist leader, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has jailed high-profile political opponents. In an attempt to thaw relations, Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos will visit Turkey on Friday. Ahead of her trip, Kos told POLITICO in a written statement: “Peace in Ukraine will change the realities in Europe, especially in the Black Sea region. Türkiye will be a very important partner for us.” “Preparing for peace and stability in Europe implies preparing a strong partnership with Türkiye,” she added. Turkey is a military heavyweight. It has the second-largest armed forces in NATO and holds a crucial strategic position in the Mediterranean and Middle East. Ankara’s control of the Bosphorus gives it immense sway over regional security, and it played a key role in brokering the Black Sea deal in July 2022 that granted safe passage to ships carrying Ukrainian grain. The country of 88 million people has also said it is willing to send peacekeeping troops to Ukraine if a deal is struck with Russia, and that it would take a leading role in Black Sea security.  However, relations between the EU and Turkey have deteriorated over the years, and have hardly been helped by Erdoğan’s lurch to autocracy and his crackdown on opposition mayors. Although officially a candidate to join the EU, the negotiations have been frozen since 2018. “In the latest EU enlargement reports we have seen steps away from EU standards, especially on the rule of law and democracy,” Kos said. “I know Türkiye has a very long democratic tradition and also a strong civil society, and this is what we need to see strengthened to build trust between the EU and Türkiye.” In Ankara, to take the first steps to a rapprochement, Kos will attend a ceremony in which the European Investment Bank and Turkey will sign off on €200 million in loans for renewable energy projects. The EIB suspended new lending to Turkey in 2019 because of a dispute over oil and gas drilling off Cyprus. Also on Friday, the Commission will unveil a study on “advancing a cross-regional connectivity agenda” with Turkey, Central Europe and the South Caucasus. The study, seen by POLITICO, maps out how investment is needed to strengthen transport, trade, energy and digital connections along the Trans-Caspian Corridor, which links China, Central Asia, the South Caucasus and the Black Sea. These are symbolic first steps toward bringing Ankara back into the fold, but they’re not what Turkey really wants from the EU — that would be an updated customs union agreement. The old deal was signed in 1995. New trade agreements signed by Brussels with India and the Mercosur group of South American countries put Turkey at a competitive disadvantage. Once they’re in place, Ankara will be forced to grant tariff-free access to goods from those countries, but that benefit won’t be reciprocated. Even Ekrem İmamoğlu, the democratically elected mayor of Istanbul, whose arrest last March triggered massive nationwide protests and international condemnation, weighed in in favor of upgrading the customs union deal. In a plea sent from his prison cell to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, European Council chief António Costa and Parliament President Roberta Metsola, İmamoğlu asked the EU to modernize the customs agreement with Turkey. “The Customs Union remains the only rules-based and normative framework underpinning Türkiye–EU relations,” İmamoğlu said in a social media post Thursday. “In the wake of EU free trade agreements with Mercosur and India, the asymmetrical consequences for Türkiye have become increasingly visible.” Updating Turkey’s deal would require buy-in from the European Council. However, Greece and Cyprus are staunchly opposed to warming relations without a goodwill gesture first from Ankara. Cyprus wants Ankara to allow its ships into Turkish ports, according to an EU official. Ankara does not recognize Cyprus due to the 1974 division of the island following a Turkish military invasion. “The strength of any future partnership needs to be underpinned by good political relations with our member states, and especially good neighbourly relations and relations with Cyprus,” Kos said. Cyprus’ deputy minister for European affairs, Marilena Raouna, told POLITICO that the country’s presidency of the Council of the EU “can be an opportunity” for EU-Turkey relations. She said Cyprus “has been constructive. And we look to Türkiye to also engage constructively.” So far, Ankara has shown little appetite to extend an olive branch. Last year it rejected Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides’ proposal that Turkey open its ports to Cypriot-flagged ships in exchange for easier access to European visas for Turkish businesspeople. But U.S. President Donald Trump’s reshaping of geopolitical and trade relationships could push Europe and Turkey back toward one another. “The world is changing and history is accelerating. Türkiye-EU relations also need to adapt,” Turkey’s ambassador to the EU, Yaprak Balkan, told POLITICO. “The way these relations can become stronger is by building on mutual interests. We hope that we can build upon this philosophy in a very concrete manner. Türkiye’s strategic objective continues to be accession to the European Union and this should be the guiding light in our relations.” Restarting EU membership negotiations is not in the EU’s thinking just yet. Still, Kos said that “we need to look with fresh eyes at our relations” with the country. “My visit to Ankara … is about rebuilding trust and exploring how we can make our economic relationship work better for both sides.”

BRUSSELS — The European Union is pressing ahead with talks to grant United States border authorities unprecedented access to Europeans’ data, despite growing concerns about American surveillance. The European Commission is brokering a deal to exchange information about travelers, including fingerprints and law enforcement records, so the U.S. can determine if they “pose a risk to public security or public order,” according to official documents. Commission officials flew to Washington last week for the first round of negotiations, according to two people familiar with the matter. The Trump administration’s request for deeper access comes after the U.S. border agency in December proposed reviewing five years of social media history. Talks are happening as the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) service is under heavy scrutiny for its use of surveillance technology against protesters in cities such as Minneapolis. The negotiations should be “put on hold” until the security and privacy of citizens in the EU and U.S. can be guaranteed, liberal European Parliament member Raquel García Hermida-van der Walle said in an interview. Romain Lanneau, a legal researcher with surveillance watchdog Statewatch, said police databases in Europe could contain information on anyone from protesters to journalists who might be considered a “threat,” and that — under the deal being discussed — this information would be at the fingertips of U.S. border authorities who could refuse those people entry to the United States or even detain them. European regulators are “very cautiously looking at what’s happening in the United States,” Wojciech Wiewiórowski, the EU’s in-house data protection supervisor, told POLITICO. Europe “has to be careful” about how it allows the data of Europeans to flow to the U.S., he said.  Hermida-van der Walle in January co-signed a letter by six prominent lawmakers calling on the Commission to stand down given the “current geopolitical context,” despite Washington’s admonition that failure to reach a deal will mean Europeans lose access to its visa waiver program. UNPRECEDENTED ACCESS The U.S. is seeking access to information including biometric data such as fingerprints that is stored on national databases in European countries, according to an explanatory note sent to national experts. The data would be used to “address irregular migration and to prevent, detect, and combat serious crime and terrorist offences,” the note said. In an earlier opinion on the deal, the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) — a watchdog that advises the Commission on privacy policies — noted the deal would be the first of its kind to enable “large-scale sharing of personal data … for the purpose of border and immigration control” with a non-EU country. The Commission would negotiate a framework deal that would serve as a template for bilateral agreements called Enhanced Border Security Partnerships (EBSPs), which national governments agree with Washington. EU countries in December signed off on the Commission’s request to start talks with the U.S. Washington is pressuring its EU counterparts by imposing a deadline for the bilateral deals to be agreed by the end of 2026. If countries fail to reach a deal with the U.S. they risk being cut from the latter’s visa waiver program. The U.S has made it mandatory for all countries that are part of the visa waiver program to have an EBSP in place. “The pressure which the United States is extorting on our member states, the threats that if you don’t agree with this we will cancel your access to the visa waiver program, that is an element of blackmail that we cannot let go,” Hermida-van der Walle said. The EDPS watchdog has cautioned that the scope of data sharing should be as narrow as possible, with clear justifications for every query; transparency around how the data is used; and judicial redress available in the U.S. for any person. Commission spokesperson Markus Lammert emphasised at a recent press briefing that the framework being negotiated will involve “clear and robust safeguards on data protection,” and will ensure “a non-systematic nature of the information exchange and that the exchange is limited to what is strictly necessary to achieve the objectives of this cooperation.”  US PRIVACY UNDER PRESSURE Access to the data is the latest issue putting pressure on a troubled relationship between the U.S. and the EU on data privacy. Since whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013 revealed U.S. mass surveillance practices affecting Europeans, the EU has tightened controls on how Washington handles Europeans’ data. Since the return of Donald Trump as president last year, officials and rights groups have deplored a move by the U.S. administration to gut a key privacy watchdog tasked with overseeing privacy safeguards in place to protect Europeans. The Trump administration has also been ramping up mass surveillance of citizens by federal agencies like ICE, including through contracts with Israeli spyware company Paragon, surveillance giant Palantir and other firms. Capgemini, a prominent French IT firm, on Sunday said it was selling off its American activities after it faced political backlash from the French government that its software was being used by ICE authorities. Civil rights groups, lawmakers and other watchdogs fear the new EU-U.S. data sharing deals would add to backsliding on privacy rights.    “The current initiatives are being presented as toward counter-terrorism, but a lot of them are actually adopted for the chilling effect [on political activism],” Statewatch’s Lanneau said. Hermida-van der Walle, the liberal lawmaker, warned: “If people have to go to the United States, if it’s not a choice but something that they have do, there is a risk of self-censoring.”  “This comes from an administration who claims to be the biggest defender of free speech. What they’re doing with their actions is curtailing the possibility of people to express themselves freely, because otherwise they might not get access into the country,” she said.

BEIJING — Keir Starmer wants to take the U.K. deeper into the European Union single market — if Brussels will let him. Speaking to reporters during a visit to China, the British prime minister said he wanted to “go further” in aligning with the European market where it is “in our national interest.” In May last year Starmer effectively agreed to take the U.K. back into Brussels’ orbit in two sectors: agriculture and electricity. Those agreements, which are currently being finalized, will see the U.K. follow relevant EU regulations — in exchange for more seamless market access. Seemingly buoyed by a positive reception and a smaller than anticipated Brexiteer backlash, Starmer is now doubling down. “I think the relationship with the EU and every summit should be iterative. We should be seeking to go further,” the prime minister told reporters. “And I think there are other areas in the single market where we should look to see whether we can’t make more progress. That will depend on our discussions and what we think is in our national interest. “But what I’m indicating here is — I do think we can go further.” The comments are a significant rhetorical shift for the Labour leader, whose 2024 election manifesto promised that “there will be no return to the single market” — as well as the customs union or free movement. While the Labour government has softened on the single market in office, it has arguably hardened on the customs union. Starmer told reporters that “the place to look is the single market, rather than the customs union,” arguing that joining the latter would require unpicking trade deals struck under Britain’s newly independent trade policy. GOING SWISS? While EU officials say they are always open to concrete U.K. proposals, rejoining the single market sector-by-sector might not be entirely straightforward. Brussels agreed to British access for agriculture and electricity in part because of pressure from European industry, which will arguably benefit from the new arrangements as much as the British side. But the dynamic is different in other sectors, where some European firms have been able to thrive at the expense of their locked-out British competitors. There will also be debates in Brussels about where the bloc should draw the line in granting single market access to a country that does not accept the free movement of people — a requirement other states like Norway and Switzerland must respect. Officials are also wary that the EU-U.K. relationship may come to resemble the worst aspects of the Swiss one, a complicated mess of agreements which is subject to endless renegotiation and widely disliked in Brussels. CHEMICAL ATTRACTION The prime minister would not elaborate on which sectors the U.K. should seek agreements with the EU on, stating only that “we’re negotiating with the EU as we go into the next summit.” British officials say that for now they are focused on negotiating the agreements promised at last May’s meeting. One senior business representative in Brussels, granted anonymity because their role does not authorize them to speak publicly, said alignment in sectors including chemicals, cosmetics, and medical devices could be advantageous to businesses on both sides of the English Channel. As well as the agreements on electricity and agriculture, the U.K. and EU last May agreed a security agreement to cooperate more closely on defense, and to link their emissions trading systems to exempt each other from their respective carbon border taxes. They also agreed to establish a youth mobility scheme, which will see young people get visas to live abroad for a limited period. Starmer reiterated the U.K.’s position that “there has got to be a cap” on the number of people who can take advantage of the scheme and “there has got to be a duration agreed.” “And it will be a visa-led scheme. All of our schemes are similar to that. We are negotiating,” he added. Dan Bloom reported from Beijing. Jon Stone reported from Brussels.