Following intense pressure from his fellow Labour Party members, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has announced his resignation.

In Berlin, the news of Starmer's departure has left some feeling a bit heavy-hearted. "For the German government, Keir Starmer has always been a reliable and close partner on foreign policy issues, especially concerning Ukraine," said government spokesperson Stefan Kornelius on Monday (June 22). And German politicians are well aware that it was Starmer, in particular, who worked to rebuild relations with the EU, especially with Germany, in the wake of Brexit.

It has now been ten years since Britain held a referendum on leaving the EU. When the results were announced on the morning of June 24, 2016, shockwaves rippled through the European Union — and especially Germany. Just under 52% had voted to leave the European Union, while 48% voted against it. The then-German Foreign Minister and current Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier called it a "disaster," while then-Chancellor Angela Merkel described it as a profound turning point for Europe.

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Few in Germany had been anticipating such an outcome. For most politicians and journalists, leaving the EU, and with it the benefits of the European single market, simply seemed too outlandish. However, the British campaign to "take back control" — led primarily by Boris Johnson of the Conservative Party — had been seriously underestimated, especially in Germany.

Supporters of Brexit also wanted to reassert control over immigration. On this issue, Germany bore some significance for the outcome of the referendum. Merkel's open-border policy, implemented in September 2015, meant that naturalized migrants automatically had the right to settle in the United Kingdom as well.

"Migration policy was a decisive factor in the Brexit decision," says Christophe Fricker of the University of Bristol in England, who has published extensively on the topic of Brexit. However, he also pointed out, "It's ironic that since Brexit, immigration figures have risen significantly once again — just not from the EU."

German-British trade has plummeted

After years of negotiations, the United Kingdom officially left the European Union on January 31, 2020, but it was not until January 1, 2021, that the country finally severed all ties with the single market and the customs union.

Perhaps the best indication of what has changed since is how trade between Germany and the United Kingdom has been affected. According to the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce, trade has declined significantly since Brexit. While the United Kingdom was Germany's fifth-largest trading partner in 2016, today it ranks only ninth.

However, according to Christophe Fricker, Germany has not only lost a strong trade partner: "What we've lost is a strong defense partner. This is now the key issue around which cooperation is beginning again. And, of course, we've lost friends. There used to be very, very close relationships, both on a personal level and across civil society. And that has become more difficult and less frequent." He laments that, for German youth, the United Kingdom has simply "vanished off the map."

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New cooperation in defense

In the meantime, however, the two countries have been moving closer together for some time now. German-British trade is governed by the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement, so it is not in the hands of the government of any single EU member state.

But the two countries have been moving closer together bilaterally nonetheless, most notably as a result of two agreements on defense. The first was the Trinity House defense agreement, signed in October 2024, which aimed to strengthen cooperation in the defense sector. This was expanded in July 2025 by the Kensington Treaty, a friendship treaty designed to deepen British-German relations more broadly.

King Charles's three-day state visit to Berlin and Hamburg in March 2023 also played an important role in bilateral relations following Brexit. During the visit, Charles delivered the first speech by a British monarch in the German Bundestag, part of which was in German.

Burnham is considered to be pro-Germany and pro-EU

The current leaders of both governments, Friedrich Merz and Keir Starmer, hail from two distinct political traditions: Starmer from the social-democratic Labor Party, and Merz from the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU).

And yet, Linn Selle of the German Council on Foreign Relations believes they have quite a bit in common: "Starmer is just as much a pragmatist as Merz, and both are united by their strong support for Ukraine," Selle told DW. "Merz is also heavily influenced by Anglo-Saxon traditions, closely followed Brexit and would certainly like to see closer political ties between the United Kingdom and the European Union."

But Starmer is now quickly fading into the past. However, he is still expected to attend the next meeting of the so-called E5 Group (Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Italy and Poland) in support of Ukraine, which will take place on Wednesday in Berlin.

And his likely successor, Andy Burnham, is expected to press ahead with efforts to rebuild ties with the EU. Burnham is considered a staunch pro-European and has repeatedly criticized Brexit in the past.

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During his long tenure as mayor of Greater Manchester, he has also championed British-German exchange. In 2021, Burnham signed an agreement with the regional metropolitan area of the Ruhr — the first regional partnership between the two countries. And in 2025, together with German representatives, he established collaborative efforts in the fields of hydrogen, cybersecurity and digital health.

No plans for a new referendum on EU membership

How would a referendum on leaving the EU turn out in the UK today? "The polls have shifted recently, and a majority of people now appear to support remaining in the EU; in fact, public opinion has been leaning that way for a while now and seems to be solidifying," says Christophe Fricker of the University of Bristol. "A whole lot of people here have definitely realized that leaving wasn't a good idea and that it has hurt them."

And yet, not a single leading British politician from any of the major parties — not even Andy Burnham — is currently calling for a new vote on the matter. The German government will therefore have to live with the situation for the foreseeable future and try together with the British to make the best of it — as long as there is a government in London that is willing to do the same.

This article was translated from German.