The Club of Three held a second Fireside Chat on the topic of Brexit on 15 June, just over a week before the UK’s referendum on its membership of the EU.
Lord Robertson of Port Ellen gave a keynote address on the security and strategic implications of a Brexit. He was Secretary General of NATO between 1999 and 2004 and served as UK Defence Secretary from 1997 to 1999 under the first Blair government. Lord Robertson is also a former Shadow Secretary of State for Scotland.
In May 2016, he had signed a joint letter published in The Telegraph together with several other former NATO Secretaries General to express concern that Brexit would pose a serious security risk for Britain and Europe. This message had increasingly been taken up by former UK Prime Minister David Cameron.
The meeting was organised in partnership with Professor Margarita Mathiopoulos, founder and CEO of ASPIDE and involved 25 business leaders, politicians and diplomats from France, Germany and the UK and other senior European figures including Radoslaw Sikorski, former Polish Foreign Affairs Minister. Other participants included: Peter Ammon (German Ambassador to the UK); Sylvie Bermann (French Ambassador to the UK); and Philippe Legrain (Senior Visiting Fellow, European Institute at the London School of Economics).