On same day Trump lands, Starmer’s EU minister agrees to take in EU’s young unemployed, and 1.2m ‘inactive young Brits’ data is released

More bad news buried as Starmer’s EU Minister gives green light to immigration of EU’s young unemployed

Why doesn’t he start by helping the 1.2 million British young who are ‘economically inactive’?

Stand for Our Sovereignty & Facts4EU reveal shocking numbers of Britain’s young who are doing nothing

In Bruges on Tuesday while all eyes were on the arrival of President Trump, Sir Keir Starmer’s arch-Rejoiner Minister for EU relations, Nick Thomas-Symonds, effectively linked Starmer’s EU trade reset with the UK joining the EU’s defence programme, as well as agreeing to the ‘Youth Experience Scheme’ and the hugely expensive Erasmus+ project.

Unfortunately for Starmer’s EU Minister, he didn’t know the ONS were releasing its latest data for the UK’s appalling ‘economically inactive young Brits’ data. Fortunately for the public, Facts4EU did know this, and we worked together to ensure the public are informed.

‘Open borders’ scheme into the UK for the EU’s under-30s is being negotiated

Once again it seems that the EU has succeeded in making a few small concessions the UK wants, conditional on the UK agreeing to a raft of wholly unconnected matters which the EU wants.

The Prime Minister has already agreed to give the EU access to the UK’s sovereign waters for a further 12 years – and received nothing in return.

Now it seems from the UK Minister’s speech that the Government is set to agree to take in many hundreds of thousands of the EU’s unemployed under-30s. On top of that, it appears that the UK will indeed participate in the EU’s multi-billion-euro defence equipment programme, which will require a £1bn+ payment from the UK purely to give UK firms the opportunity to bid for EU defence work, but with no guarantees of winning any contracts.

This is not the kind of Bruges speech Lady Thatcher gave all those years ago

The Government’s acquiescence to the EU’s demands came obliquely and apparently innocuously, as they so often do. For seasoned observers of such things, however, the seemingly innocent remarks carried a much more sinister meaning.

The occasion was a speech at the ‘College of Europe’ in Bruges on Tuesday (16 Sept 2025) where the Minister for EU Relations Nick Thomas-Symonds said the following:

In the above, ‘trade barriers’ refers to the EU’s ‘SPS agri-food’ scheme, which the Government has already agreed to and which overwhelmingly benefits EU farmers. ‘Strengthening our shared defences’ refers to the EU’s vastly expensive SAFE defence equipment programme, which overwhelmingly benefits French and German arms manufacturers. In this report, however, we focus on the latter commitment – free movement for the EU’s young unemployed.

Before taking in the EU’s young unemployed, what about first helping our own?

Facts4EU has previously reported on the deeply worrying numbers of young people who are not only unemployed and not in education or in any training schemes, (the so-called “NEETs”), but who are not even looking for work. In other words, they are what the statisticians refer to as “inactive”.

In today’s report we and Facts4EU look slightly wider. The ‘NEETs’ classification conveniently excludes young people aged 16 to 24 years who are in only part-time education. The ‘NEETs’ numbers can therefore exclude a young person who enrols in some local community college – or even a mosque or synagogue or other institution – to study ‘diversity, equity, and inclusion’, or ‘Palestinian peace and Israeli occupation’, for five hours a week.

A better classification for ‘economically inactive’ – and it comes from the Office for National Statistics

Fortunately, on the same day that Nick Thomas Symonds got to his feet in Bruges to address the disciples of the EU superstate religion, the UK’s Office for National Statistics published its latest figures for ‘People aged 16 to 24 by educational status, economic activity and inactivity, seasonally adjusted’. The figures in this set of data look only at those in employment or registered unemployed, and not in full-time education. They include those in only part-time education as being ‘economically inactive’, which seems to be a more reasonable measure.

What the Government told us

Last year Brexit Facts4EU.Org contacted both the Dept for Education (DES) and the Dept of Work and Pensions (DWP). Their contacts were as helpful as they could be and they fully accepted that the issue we have raised above is a problem, “And it’s one the Government is taking very seriously.” Both departments admitted that the NEETs problem lies between the responsibilities of each.

In answer to their main question, neither of the Departments had any information on what this group of more than 800,000 young people (out of the 1.2 million), who aren’t even looking for work, are doing.

To those who are inclined to be generous and who will say that most of the 800,000 must be studying part-time, we know this is not correct. The last time the ONS published figures on those in part-time education, they amounted to just 237,000. And, as we have pointed out above, ‘part-time education’ can be very part-time indeed.

Two years ago the then Work and Pensions Secretary, the Rt Hon Liz Kendall, talked about the Government’s ‘Back to Work Plan’, saying :

Observations

1.2 million young Britons aged 16 to 24 years-old represents an amazing pool of potential talent, completely unused by the country. It is very troubling that this number looks set to rise, as the Government’s new employment laws are beginning to bite. Employers have already said they are cutting back on recruitment and the data confirms this. With the new employment laws soon to come, this will exacerbate the situation further.

What is even more concerning is that nothing appears to have been done to identify the 800,000 who are not working, not looking for work, and not in full-time education.

On top of this, we have Sir Keir Starmer’s Minister for EU Relations delivering a very chatty and positive Bruges speech on the same day the appalling new figures were released, apparently moving ahead with the EU’s demands to allow many hundreds of thousands of their unemployed under-30s to enter the UK for four years (renewable of course).

Would it not be better to tell the EU “Not for the moment, thanks. We have to put our own house in order first.”?

The UK a sovereign nation?

In his speech on Tuesday, Nick Thomas-Symonds referred rather disparagingly to those of us who interpret sovereignty in its conventional sense. We would simply say to him that one of the tenets of being a sovereign nation is its ability to control its own borders. A new ‘open borders for the under-30s (possibly under-35s)’ policy inflicted on the UK by the EU is one more nail in the coffin of the idea of the United Kingdom as a sovereign nation.

Please, please help us to carry on our vital work in defence of independence, sovereignty, democracy and freedom.

Main image: Montage © Stand for Our Sovereignty 2025