New PM eves fresh start with EU

Starmer seeks to strengthen trade, research and defence relationships with continent

- BRIAN MELLEY

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer was in Edinburgh Sunday on a visit he billed as an "immediate reset" with the regional governments of Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales.

LONDON British Prime Minister Keir Starmer is seeking to reset relations at home and abroad.

During a visit Sunday to Edinburgh, that he billed as an “immediate reset” with the regional governments of Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales, Starmer said he would also seek to improve the U.K.’s “botched” trade deal with the European Union.

“I do think that we can get a much better deal than the botched deal that (former prime minister) Boris Johnson saddled the U.K. with,” he said in reference to the pact negotiated after Brexit.

Starmer said there were many discussions ahead to strengthen trading, research and defence ties with the EU. But he said those talks had begun as his top diplomat made his first visit abroad to Germany, Poland and Sweden.

With two of Starmer’s ministers in Europe ahead of a NATO meeting next week, the premier made a point of visiting the leaders of the regional governments in the U.K. following his party’s landslide victory last week.