Brits who hate leaving the dog behind on a European holiday may soon get a break. A draft agreement between the UK and the EU, due to be ratified at the EU-UK summit on 20 November 2026, would make the old-style EU pet passport valid again for travel from Great Britain to EU countries.

Here's the background. Before Brexit, UK pet owners could pick up a pet passport from a vet for roughly £100, valid for the animal's lifetime. It proved the pet was microchipped and rabies-vaccinated, and that was enough to cross the Channel. After the UK left the EU, it was reclassified as a third country, and from 2021 the pet passport was replaced by the Animal Health Certificate (AHC).

The AHC is a much worse deal for travellers. It costs between £100 and £300 — up to triple the old passport — has to be issued no more than 10 days before each trip, and a fresh certificate is required for every single journey. Some owners simply can't justify the cost, and the hassle has quietly pushed pets out of European holiday plans. A handful of destinations, including Ireland, Finland, Malta and Norway, add another requirement: dogs need tapeworm treatment between one and five days before travelling.

If the new deal goes through, one passport would once again cover repeat trips, saving regular travellers hundreds of pounds and a vet appointment before every getaway. Under Prime Minister Andy Burnham, the UK and EU have been working through a broader reset, and this sits alongside other headline measures in the same package: a youth mobility scheme for under-30s, restored export access for British food producers, and UK participation in the EU's emissions trading scheme. The government values the overall SPS agreement at £5.1 billion, with British sausages returning to EU shelves and £200 Export Health Certificates for exporters scrapped.

For holidaymakers, the fine print matters. The deal only gets the green light if the 200-page draft is ratified on schedule, and in exchange the UK would have to keep aligning with current EU animal and food-trade rules. Timing is also worth watching: even after ratification, practical changes to how you book pet travel will take time to roll out, so anyone planning an early-2027 trip with a dog or cat should still budget for an AHC until the scheme formally switches over.

Still, the direction of travel is clear. If you've been pricing up flights and then sighing at the £300 vet bill every time, this could be the moment taking your pet to France, Spain or Italy becomes affordable again. Watch for confirmation from the November 2026 summit, then check with your vet about switching back to a passport.