Brexit

Saturday

James Forsyth

Theresa May’s inner Cabinet is considering a role for the ECJ after Brexit

From our UK edition

‘It’ll be curtains for the process’ if the Brexit talks don’t move on to trade and transition in December, according to one of those familiar with the UK government’s negotiating strategy. In Downing Street, there is a feeling that Theresa May has twice made significant compromises—in the Florence speech and the enhanced financial offer the inner Cabinet agreed on Monday—and if the EU again pockets the concession and says still more is needed, it’ll be hard to see how the UK can stay at the table. Even one of the Cabinet Ministers most keen on a deal with the EU says that ‘we have to get through in December’.

Friday

Alex Massie

Ireland has punctured Brexiteers’ wishful thinking

From our UK edition

In his column this week, James Forsyth reports there is ‘mounting anger’ inside the government at the way the Irish government are behaving over Brexit. I am sure there is, though it still surprises me that people are surprised to discover that the Irish government is defending its own interests. Doubtless this is why you will sometimes find exuberant Brexiteers suggesting that the answer to the Irish problem is for the Irish to leave the EU too. That might work in theory; it doesn’t do so in practice. I’m afraid things are a little more complicated than that. Now it is, of course, tiresome that Brexit is being complicated by the Hibernians. But none of this was unforeseeable and none of it should be a surprise.

Fraser Nelson

After Brexit, Britain will still have European cities. Can someone tell the EU?

From our UK edition

When Britain voted to leave the EU, it didn’t necessarily follow that we’d be kicked out of its European Capital of Culture scheme – given that it aimed to be exactly that, rather than an EU Capital of Culture. After all Istanbul, Reykjavík and Stavanger all qualified and all won. There were some ominous signs: a few weeks ago, the European Parliament voted to amend the rules the scheme should be open to candidate states and EEA nations - butno mention was made of former members. So Iceland would be included in consideration for European status, but Britain excluded. It looked like a mean-hearted attempt to punish Britain for leaving, but could it really be so?

Thursday

Nick Hilton

The Spectator Podcast: Merkel’s crack-up

From our UK edition

On this week’s episode, we look at the situation in Germany, and whether Angela Merkel can hold things together. We also speak to Norway’s immigration minister, and discuss the dying art of cottaging. After 12 years as Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel is this week facing the worst crisis of her premiership. Coalition talks collapsed after the Free Democrats walked away from negotiations with Merkel’s Christian Democrats. So where does this leave Germany? In the magazine this week, William Cook calls the situation ‘uniquely damaging’, whilst James Forsyth outlines the implications for Brexit. James joined the podcast, along with Thomas Kielinger, London correspondent for Die Welt.

William Cook

Merkel’s thin ice

From our UK edition

 Trier, Rhineland Was it really just a few months ago that Angela Merkel was being hailed as the leader of the western world? A few months since she was lauded as the only politician who could stand up to Trump? How quickly her power has ebbed away. Today she looks defeated, as if she knows her days are numbered. Whenever she goes, however she goes, this is surely the beginning of the end. One German commentator has likened it to Götterdämmerung — the twilight of the gods. Six months ago, here in the Rhineland, Merkel staged an amazing comeback, beating Martin Schulz’s Social Democrats in his own backyard. Going into that regional election, in North Rhine Westphalia, her Christian Democrats were trailing Schulz’s SPD by 13 per cent.

Andrew Watts

Legal challenge

From our UK edition

Last week the Daily Telegraph’s front page showed the 15 Tory MPs who had voted against the government under the headline ‘The Brexit Mutineers’. One of the first things pointed out was that two thirds of the group were lawyers. (In fact, only nine of the 15 are barristers or solicitors; a tenth is the son of a High Court judge, but in the hereditary meritocracy in which we live, that counts as the same thing.) This seemed to be taken as a point in their favour — who wouldn’t want our politicians to be sensible lawyers? Certainly, it contrasted with the disdain shown for journalist-politicians, like Michael Gove or Boris Johnson. Would we really rather our MPs were lawyers than hacks?

James Forsyth

The Irish gamble

From our UK edition

Never has a European Council been so important to a British prime minister as this December’s is to Theresa May. In No. 10 there has long been a belief that if she can get ‘sufficient progress’ in the Brexit talks to move on to trade and the transition, it will provide her with a political adrenalin shot. This is why a reshuffle has been pencilled in for afterwards. But if she fails to achieve her aim at the December council, her premiership will be further destabilised. The trouble is that when it comes to Brexit, the Prime Minister tends to postpone talking to her cabinet until as late as possible. It was only this week that the cabinet’s new Brexit strategy committee discussed how much the UK was prepared to offer to move things on.

Martin Vander Weyer

The very simple reason why Hammond’s housebuilding target is pie in the sky

From our UK edition

The Chancellor sounded purposeful when he declared that he’ll do ‘whatever it takes’ to boost the rate of housebuilding — including pushing developers and councils to use up land banks and act on existing planning permissions — with a view to hitting a politically symbolic target of 300,000 units per year. But I wonder whether the post-Budget small print will reveal any sort of plan to overcome the most basic obstacle to achieving this objective, which is a critical shortage of bricks? When housebuilding went into sharp decline after the 2008 crisis, many British brick factories closed down. To build even half of Philip Hammond’s target, the industry needs more than 2.

Wednesday

Isabel Hardman

Jeremy Corbyn says the B word during PMQs

From our UK edition

Jeremy Corbyn rarely talks about Brexit at Prime Minister’s Questions, and it is interesting that he chose today’s session, which will get little attention as a result of the Budget, to probe Theresa May on the matter. The Labour leader did have a good stint, quoting a number of European negotiators, Tory backbenchers and Cabinet Ministers who have made comments to the effect that the British government doesn’t know what it is doing on Brexit. He also accused the Tories of blocking measures protecting workers’ rights and acknowledging that animals are sentient beings. But Theresa May was on good form, too, continuing to appear as though she is regaining her confidence somewhat.

Brendan O’Neill

Stop Funding Hate has a simple aim: political censorship

From our UK edition

Here’s a law of politics that is about as cast-iron as a law of politics can be: people who hate tabloid newspapers are snobs. Every time. Scratch a Daily Mail basher or those people who seethe daily about the Sun and you will find someone who’s really just scared of the throng and of what all this tabloid fare is doing to their brains.

Tom Goodenough

What the papers say: Hammond must beware the danger of playing it safe

From our UK edition

Philip Hammond’s second Budget of the year will mean that the Chancellor has another 'bite at a not especially flavoursome cherry’, says the Daily Telegraph. The last time, his announcements ‘misfired’; since then Hammond's ‘room for manoeuvre’ has become even more limited. This means that many in the Tory ranks are not filled with ‘great expectations’ about what Hammond might say and instead, says the Telegraph, they ’are just anxious to see Mr Hammond through the day without mishap’. But playing it safe won't be enough for the Tories, according to the paper, which argues in its editorial that it doing so would ‘throw away the opportunity’ for the government to ‘take the initiative’.

Tuesday

Steerpike

Watch: David Davis crashes out

From our UK edition

David Davis has just given a speech on the Brexit transition period – intended to prevent Britain from crashing out of the EU in a disorderly manner. But at the end of his address, it seems that he was personally advocating a different type of transition. As Davis said his goodbyes, he took a tumble. Mr S hopes it's not a sign of things to come...

Tom Goodenough

What the papers say: The EU is in the grip of chaos

From our UK edition

Donald Tusk’s jibe that Britain was no longer attempting to have its cake and eat it in Brexit talks was a clear dig at the Foreign Secretary. But now the EU is guilty of adopting the same approach, according to the Sun. Michel Barnier said yesterday that ‘he wants all his demands met’ on various issues, and also ‘wants a monstrous exit bung from Britain’. Theresa May has reportedly received the backing of her Cabinet to up this payment to £40bn. Yet this ‘won’t nearly suffice’ for the EU, says the Sun. And even if Brussels does agree, what will we get in return?

Monday

James Forsyth

What fresh German elections would mean for Brexit and Europe

From our UK edition

Angela Merkel’s declaration that new elections would be better than a minority government suggests Germany will be heading back to the polls soon. Though, it should be noted that the decision on whether to call fresh election is technically the German president’s, not Merkel’s. The so-called Jamaica coalition, bringing together Merkel’s CDU, the CSU, the Greens and the economically liberal Free Democrats, can’t be made to work as the collapse of the talks last night showed. The other alternative that would produce a majority government, another grand coalition between the CDU and the SPD, remains highly unlikely. The current consensus in the SPD is that the party needs a spell in opposition to recover; in September, it garnered only 20.

Ross Clark

For real political chaos, take a look at Germany

From our UK edition

The female leader of a prominent European country fails to win a majority in an election and then struggles to form a coalition. Meanwhile, her government limps from crisis to crisis and finally negotiations break down, leading to another general election just weeks later. Not Theresa May, obviously, because she had little difficulty in forming a workable coalition with the DUP. But it is the situation in Germany where today Angela Merkel said that she has given up on trying to create a workable government with the Free Democratic Party, the Christian Social Union and the Greens. There will now almost inevitably have to be another general election, with Angela Merkel – rather than Theresa May – likely to be out on her ear by Christmas.

Tom Goodenough

Michel Barnier’s Brexit trade deal warning

From our UK edition

The furore over the Brexit divorce bill has been such that it is easy to forget that it isn't the only major sticking point in talks with the EU. Theresa May looks set to up Britain’s offer this week (from €20bn to around €40bn), in the hope that more cash on the table will unlock the next stage of negotiations. But Michel Barnier’s speech today should serve as a warning to the British government: things won’t necessarily get easier when the Brexit divorce bill is sorted. In fact, Barnier makes it clear that talks could get even more difficult. The EU’s chief negotiator hinted that Britain would still miss out on a trade deal if it doesn’t agree to tie itself down to a ‘European model’ after Brexit.

Jamie Bartlett

Can you distinguish between a bot and a human?

From our UK edition

We’ve all gone a bit bot-mad in the past few weeks. Automated accounts have invaded our civic life – especially pesky Russian ones – and politicians on both sides of the Atlantic have woken up to the fact that a new propaganda war is taking place online. Bots – which is of course short for robot – are essentially accounts which can be programmed to automatically post, share, re-tweet, or do whatever the programmer chooses. Creating a bot is extremely easy, and huge amounts of cheap bots are available on dark net markets for next to nothing. There are millions of harmless bots out there doing all sorts of helpful and funny things, including breaking news stories. But Russia twigged early that bots can also be usefully deployed to influence public opinion.

William Cook

Germany’s political crisis puts Merkel’s future in doubt

From our UK edition

When I had lunch with a senior CDU politician in Düsseldorf on Saturday, there was no sign that Germany’s coalition talks were about to break down so abruptly, plunging the Bundesrepublik into a political crisis with no solution in sight. Sure, negotiations had dragged on for weeks, said the man from Merkel’s party, but that wasn’t unusual here in Germany. They’d probably drag on until January, but the participants would eventually work something out. The next day his comfortable prediction was confounded, as Christian Lindner’s Free Democratic Party walked out of the coalition talks. ‘It became clear that the parties weren’t able to develop a common idea of how to modernise Germany,’ said Lindner.

Mary Dejevsky

The riddle of Theresa May’s Russia policy

From our UK edition

It is just a week since Theresa May used her Mansion House speech to launch a broadside on Russia. During a wide-ranging survey of the international horizon, it was Russia she singled out for special criticism and it was her Russia attack that attracted (and was surely intended to attract) the headlines. Just a reminder of what she said. Russia was 'chief' among those who seek to undermine 'our open economies and free societies'. Not only had it annexed Crimea illegally, but it had fomented conflict in the Donbas, repeatedly violated the national airspace of several European countries, and waged a 'sustained campaign of cyber espionage and disruption'. And this was the climax: 'It is seeking to weaponise information.

Fraser Nelson

The collapse of coalition talks in Germany makes a ‘no deal’ Brexit a little more likely

From our UK edition

The Cabinet is expected to resume talks about Brexit today, reportedly nudging towards a £40 billion offer ahead of a meeting on Friday – but is there much point? Germany still has no government with Angela Merkel’s coalition talks having collapsed. The chairman of the Free Democratic Party ended talks with Merkel last night and her old coalition partners, the Social Democrats, refuse to enter a deal as this would confer opposition status on the populist AfD and thereby augmenting the progress they made in the recent federal elections. All of a sudden, Merkel’s fourth term has been thrown into question, and there’s talk of her doing a Theresa May and holding a snap election. 'It is a day of deep reflection on how to go forward in Germany', Merkel said.