After landslide win, UK's Labour wants better relations with EU

Any warming of relations will begin with setting a new tone, Luigi Scazzieri, a senior research fellow at the think-tank, Centre for European Reform, said, telling The Parliament that “a lot of it is about mood, and just having good relations and trying to build on that.” 

...“It’s a political wound that is still so fresh,” Scazzieri said. “They really didn’t want to touch it.” 

Security extends beyond military issues, and any deal could also cover foreign policy, climate and migration, for which Scazzeri said the EU-US Trade and Technology Council could serve as a model for cooperation. 

“They want to try to set up a parallel structure of consultation outside of the UK-EU trade and cooperation agreements to talk about these issues in a less constrained manner, because the TCA is very much about the economic relationship,” he said. “It's very structured and the EU is dominant in it.” 

Whether the EU is keen on that is a different question. Despite EU fears of the UK "trying to cherry pick” issues, Scazzieri can see a future where progress has been made. 

“If I were to look ahead six months, what we will have in security is a structure of dialogues between the UK and the EU to discuss certain issues,” he said, including allowing the UK to participate in EU military missions, such as in Bosnia and Herzegovina.