The urgent need to rejoin Horizon

Rishi SunakEU claims to want to . The prime minister rightly says the country has great strengths in areas that range from artificial intelligence to life sciences, though it also faces some obstacles. One of these is its post-Brexit absence from Horizon, the European Union’s (and the world’s) biggest collaborative research programme.The Brexit trade agreement signed in late 2020 by Boris Johnson, Mr Sunak’s predecessor but one, provided for Britain to remain associated with Horizon. But the plan for this fell through because of a fierce row over the Brexit terms for Northern Ireland. When Mr Sunak settled the Northern Irish question in the Windsor framework, in February, the repeated its promise of an early deal on Horizon. Although the terms for this were broadly agreed on by early July, nothing was settled. Mr Sunak’s decision whether to associate with Horizon may come soon.