Former Brexit Permanent Secretary Urges Britain to Consider the Obvious: Rejoining Europe

In a statement that has unsurprisingly resurfaced the perennial debate about the United Kingdom’s post‑Brexit trajectory, Philip Rycroft – who served as the permanent secretary of the now‑defunct Department for Exiting the EU – publicly advocated that Britain should commence a renewed dialogue about rejoining the European Union, arguing that the original promises concerning economic stability, immigration control and regulatory coherence have consistently failed to materialise and therefore merit a candid reassessment of national interests.

Rycroft, whose tenure oversaw the implementation of the very exit plan that is now being questioned, contended that the “argument was there to be won” regarding a return to the bloc, emphasizing that a “clear‑headed appraisal of what is in the country’s best interests” is required, while simultaneously acknowledging that any such reversal would likely unfold as a “long and windy” process fraught with legislative, diplomatic and domestic political hurdles that the original Brexit machinery clearly neglected to anticipate.

The former civil servant’s insistence on revisiting membership highlights a systemic shortfall wherein successive governments have repeatedly employed optimistic rhetoric about delivering tangible benefits while neglecting a structured mechanism for evaluating whether those promises have been met, thereby exposing a procedural inconsistency between the lofty objectives proclaimed at the outset of the withdrawal and the absent post‑implementation audit that would have informed a more rational policy course.

Beyond the immediate call for renewed negotiations, Rycroft’s remarks implicitly critique a broader institutional inertia that has allowed the United Kingdom to persist with a fragmented regulatory framework and a disjointed immigration system, suggesting that the very structures designed to manage the exit have become incapable of delivering coherent strategy, and that only a dramatic, albeit predictable, policy reversal—such as re‑engagement with the European Union—could plausibly address the accumulated governance deficits.

Published: April 24, 2026