ERASMUS RETURN, NHS STRIKES, UNION TENSIONS. The government agreed a deal for the UK to rejoin the EU’s Erasmus+ student exchange programme from the 2027/28 academic year. The UK’s will pay £570 million for that first year or involvement, almost double its pre-Brexit annual payments. A 30% “discount” was agreed for the first year. The scheme encourages and funds students to study or train in EU countries and vice versa.
Officials and higher-education bodies welcomed the move as a boon for opportunities and cultural exchange that were lost after the UK left Erasmus in 2020. The re-entry also forms part of broader negotiations on closer economic links with the EU, including energy markets and food and drink trade deals.
Opponents will portray the payments as evidence of pro-EU ideology or a disregard for the 2016 Brexit vote. Supporters frame it as practical re-engagement for young people. (Andrew Sparrow, The Guardian, 17th December 2025.)
It matters because this is one of the clearest examples yet of the current Labour government’s approach to UK-EU ties: reset where there is political and practical gain, while stopping short of returning to freedom of movement. Exit in name only, you could say.
junior/resident doctors strike amid flu surge
Junior doctors went on a five-day strike from 17th to 22nd December after overwhelmingly rejecting the government’s latest offer on pay and job conditions which offered improvement in training conditions but no new pay. In a union ballot, 83 per cent voted to strike on a 65 per cent turnout, with the BMA saying the offer failed to address long-standing pay erosion and career prospects. (Sam Tabahriti, Reuters, 15th December 2025.)
to patient care under the always-stretched structure of the NHS.
That ball has been dropped from a great height.
Wilful self-destruction of generations of reputation in one mad and impossible dash for a salary raise.
The strikes took place against a backdrop of the winter pressure on the NHS, driven by an early rise in flu cases and warnings that many trusts were already under severe strain. (Marissa Davison and Catarina Demony, Reuters, 17th December 2025.)
Health Secretary Wes Streeting condemned the industrial action as “self-indulgent, irresponsible and dangerous” during a flu surge and urged the strikes to be postponed until January. The BMA responded that the government’s offer did not meaningfully address doctors’ real-terms pay decline.
Political context: The dispute adds to persistent questions about NHS capacity and workforce morale, themes that continue to erode public confidence in the health service’s ability to manage normal winter pressures. It also reflects the longer continuum of NHS industrial action that has recurred even after previous settlements. (Department of Health Media Centre, 16th December 2025.)
Union pressure on Labour
The election of Andrea Egan as general secretary of Unison, Britain’s largest trade union, has injected fresh tension into Labour’s industrial and internal political landscape. Egan has announced that Unison will withdraw support from Labour’s “right wing”, criticised Wes Streeting’s approach to the junior doctors’ dispute and hinted at the possibility of coordinated strikes involving public services in 2026. (Rowena Mason, The Guardian, 19th December 2025.)
Unison’s critique weakens one of Labour’s key bases among public-sector workers and underscores the latent friction between Labour’s centrist leadership and its union affiliates. A dynamic that could become more pronounced with local elections on the horizon. (Sophia Sleigh & Kate Ferguson, The Sun, 20th December 2025.)
Labour’s attempt to balance managerial governance with union expectations is reaching a point of no return. If the largest public-sector union signals open hostility, it complicates Labour’s messaging on competence and stability.
LABOUR STILL FLOUNDERING
Labour chair Anna Turley reaffirmed that Keir Starmer will still be prime minister by this time next year , seeking to counter speculation about internal leadership tensions following mixed electoral prospects for May’s local and devolved polls. (Andrew Sparrow, The Guardian, 21st December 2025.)
In recent Commons exchanges Kemi Badenoch has hit harder on issues including unemployment, taxation and NHS strikes, while Starmer also announced the release of £2.5 billion from frozen Chelsea FC sale proceeds for Ukraine support. (Michael Paterson, UK Fact Check, 17th December 2025.)
In recent Commons exchanges Kemi Badenoch has hit harder on issues including unemployment, taxation and NHS strikes.
In contrast Starmer seems to focus on increasingly obvious distractions such as the unfreezing of the £2.5billion proceeds from the Abramovich sale of Chelsea FC for Ukraine support. (Michael Paterson, UK Fact Check, 17th December 2025.)
Badenoch is looking increasingly confident. Starmer seems vacillating and unconvincing, an interesting failure from a KC trained in public argumentation.
Economy and UK-EU relations: Health secretary Streeting, in a wide-ranging interview, urged closer trading ties with the EU as a means to grow the UK economy, stopping short of re-adopting freedom of movement but allowing talk of a customs union — a position that sits somewhat beyond the government’s formal stance. (Rowena Mason, The Guardian, 21st December 2025.)
Erasmus+ feels like a generational win for mobility, but the NHS dispute underscores persistent service fragility and Labour’s internal balancing act seems ever more precarious.
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