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French President Emmanuel Macron has asked Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne to propose a new „government of action“ that will be named in early July, according to an interview with AFP.
Macron also confirmed his confidence in Borne for the long term, AFP said in a Twitter post.
“I believe that our friends from Skopje and Tirana deserve the start of EU talks and I believe this should happen as soon as possible, which is not a matter of request, because both countries have done everything that was asked of them,” Vucic added.
He thanked Kovacevski and Rama for their “understanding” for Serbia’s unique position in its relations to Russia and for it not aligning with the EU on sanctions against Moscow over the war in Ukraine.
Beaune believes that Mélenchon’s real intention is not to become a prime minister – as he has declared – in the next legislative election but to “crush the left and kill the Socialist Party and the Greens for the benefit of Jean-Luc Mélenchon alone”.
Sinisa Mali, the current finance minister and former mayor of Belgrade, is mentioned first as a possible candidate. He is one of Aleksandar Vučić’s closest associates and has been involved in several scandals – from the destruction of the Savamala quarter in Belgrade to allegedly owning 24 apartments in Bulgaria. The University of Belgrade stripped him of his doctorate after it was confirmed that he had plagiarized his thesis.
According to European intelligence, Nikola Selaković, current Minister of Foreign Affairs, also has a chance to become the new PM. He is also a loyal associate of Aleksandar Vučić…
„Scholz has brought new energy and new hope. He wants to hear everyone in the Western Balkans and wants real prospects for EU expansion which is an important, excellent message for everyone in the Western Balkans. We also talked about the fact that Serbia must progress much faster in terms of the rule of law, democracy…“, he said.
„We will not agree to the alternatives of joining the EU, which have begun to sound again recently,“ he said.
Earlier, French President Emmanuel Macron said he was proposing to create a new political union, in which it would be possible to accept countries outside the EU, for example, Ukraine. proposing „to create what I would call a European political community.“
He said this „European political community“ would be open to democratic European nations adhering to its core values in areas such as political cooperation, security, cooperation in energy, transport, investment of infrastructure or circulation of people.
„Joining it would not necessarily prejudge future EU membership,“ he said. „Nor would it be closed to those who left it.“
In a speech to the EU’s parliament in Strasbourg, he instead suggested Ukraine could join a „parallel European community“ while it awaited a decision.
This would allow non-EU members to join Europe’s security architecture in other ways, said President Macron.
– One of Poland’s leaders said Germany is trying make EU a ‚German Fourth Reich‘
– Jaroslaw Kaczynski, 72, is the head of Poland’s ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party
– He added: ‚If we agreed with this modern-day submission we’d be degraded‘
Article 4
1.Supreme power in the Republic of Poland shall be vested in the Nation.
2.The Nation shall exercise such power directly or through their representatives.
Article 5
The Republic of Poland shall safeguard the independence and integrity of itsterritory and ensure the freedoms and rights of persons and citizens, the security ofthe citizens, safeguard the national heritage and shall ensure the protection of thenatural environment pursuant to the principles of sustainable development.
(…)
Article 7
The organs of public authority shall function on the basis of, and within the limits of,the law.
Article 81
.The Constitution shall be the supreme law of the Republic of Poland.
2.The provisions of the Constitution shall apply directly, unless the Constitutionprovides otherwise.
(08.10.2021)
Poland threw down the gauntlet to the European Union on Thursday when its Constitutional Tribunal issued a judgment that the Polish Constitution in some cases supersedes rulings by the bloc’s highest court.
The Polish judgment, which is a direct challenge to the primacy of European law, one of the cornerstones of the European Union, will only take effect once it is published by the government in an official journal, which could take some time.
With the German chancellor now on the way out, only one leader even remotely has the stature to fill her shoes. He’s in Rome, not Paris.
Elizabeth and Angela: two opposite worlds, two entirely different functions, and yet, similarities. Those boring speeches no one dares to make any more. That style, that calm, that stability and that way of embodying their countries.
Merkel now embodies more than Germany; she embodies Europe. She’s a pop icon, who has entered our consciousness like a song.
This is not to say that strategic autonomy is a bad idea — or that the EU is doomed to geopolitical irrelevance. The prospect of a trade deal with Europe or the threat of EU sanctions can shape the behaviour of countries all over the world. But economic power and moral suasion are not always an adequate substitute for military might. (As Stalin once reportedly asked: “How many divisions has the pope?”)
Well-sealed windows. No other country can make such well-sealed and nice windows.’ That was Angela Merkel’s answer when, more than a decade ago, a journalist asked her what she most associated with her native land.
Social Democrat Olaf Scholz is the favorite to become Germany’s next chancellor, but he’ll need a messy three-party coalition to form a government, according to the polls.
The path to power for the SPD and its preferred partner the Green Party is complicated. It would probably involve either a more centrist alliance with the business-friendly Free Democrats, or a shift in the opposite direction in a tie-up with the anti-capitalist Left party.
Mr. Scholz, a Social Democrat who is modeling himself as the candidate of continuity, has a fair shot at being Germany’s next chancellor.
Scheming eurocrats provoked outrage when it emerged they were drawing up plans to pull our critically-acclaimed shows like The Crown and Peaky Blinders from European streaming services. The news – which emerged in a memo sent to the EU’s 27 member states – was quickly compared to Soviet Russia which was notorious for its thought police tactics.
The EU is considering proposals to exclude British programs from European quotas, a move that could severely hit international sales of U.K. films and TV series to the EU.
German chancellor says waiver would have serious implications for production worldwide
As a young woman, Merkel was taught to believe in a Soviet system that folded 15 republics into a single state, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. In the past few months, she has sacrificed all prospects of rapid vaccination – and the lives it would save – for her own population because of her dogmatic belief in folding 27 countries into a single state called the European Union.
As Filipp Piatov, head of opinion at the German newspaper Bild, wrote last week, even in such a vital matter Merkel preferred ideology to good politics – because she was ‘so eager to demonstrate the superiority of Brussels bureaucracy to the nation state’.
Last summer Hornsey and Wood Green MP Catherine West condemned the Prime Minister’s decision to opt-out of the EU’s jabs rollout last summer, describing the decision as „dumb and dumber“. Remainers accused Mr Johnson of putting lives at risk and placing Brexit before the pandemic with the decision not to participate in the scheme.
Tory MP Peter Bone last night said: “The EU has long-term problems partly due to its its undemocratic nature.
“It’s clear that they are not serving the nations.
“It’s breakdown will depend on Germany and France and what the people in those countries think.
Embarrassingly for the bloc, it appears that Germany, the Netherlands, France and Italy had originally been looking to do a deal with AstraZeneca in May alongside the UK – but were blocked by the EU, which insisted it take over negotiations.
According to ITV’s Robert Peston: ‚The extra talks with the European Commission led to no material changes to the contract, but wasted time on making arrangements to make the vaccine with partner sites.‘
‚Mutti‘ is a canny and tactical politician but leaves a trail of wreckage behind her after running Europe’s biggest economy for 16 years
Merkel said the German cabinet would meet by telephone on 28 December to decide its stance, but added that the agreement “cannot finally enter into force until the European parliament has also given its approval”.
STRANDED truckers were ready to roll again last night after shamed French leader Emmanuel Macron was forced to reopen his country’s border with the UK.
He caved in after pressure from Britain and the EU to end a 48-hour blockade imposed amid fears over the new Covid strain.
The agreement requires every driver to have been tested for coronavirus, using controversial lateral flow tests, which are able to turn around results in under an hour but have had their effectiveness questioned.
Those who come back negative will be told by text message in as little as 20 minutes, and be given the green light to hit the road and head over to the continent, but positive cases will be sent to a hotel to isolate.
Von der Leyen spoke by telephone to Johnson on Monday night to discuss a way forward and further calls are expected in the next 24 hours, but the commission refused to offer details.
Barnier said as he went into a meeting with EU ambassadors: “We are really in the crucial moment. We are giving it the final push. In 10 days the UK will leave the single market and we continue to work in total transparency with the member states right now and with the parliament.”
The Nuffield Trust thinktank stated: “The perilously uncertain future facing the UK at the end of the Brexit transition period could put the UK’s health and care system at risk.”
The report said new migration rules, possible disruption to medicines and devices, an ongoing economic slowdown and barriers to science investment would hit the health sector.
The government has ruled out extending the deadline for reaching a post-Brexit trade deal into 2021, amid a deadlock in talks and a growing Covid crisis.
SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon and London mayor Sadiq Khan want the UK to follow EU trading rules beyond 31 December to allow more time for an agreement.
The teams led by the chief UK negotiator, David Frost, and his EU counterpart, Michel Barnier, were expected to continue talks on Monday despite the European parliament’s notice that it would not vote on a deal if not secured by midnight on Sunday.
Commenting on a proposal by European People’s Party group leader Manfred Weber that decisions on issues concerning the rule of law should be left up to the European Commission while disputes should be settled by the Court of Justice of the European Union, Orbán said: “Everyone’s talking all kinds of nonsense and this is also true for Mr. Weber.”
“We’re not stupid, we weren’t born yesterday . we can put two and two together,” the prime minister said, insisting that Weber’s proposal meant that the EU wanted to “force anything onto member states that can be painted as a rule of law issue with a simple majority vote”.
Speaking during a working visit to Prague, where he met Czech President Milos Zeman, Duda said: “There is a preliminary agreement drawn up. Work on it is still underway.”
He added: “The agreement is the result of very strenuous efforts by Poland, Hungary but also the German presidency” of the EU.
The EU is facing a crisis after Hungary and Poland vetoed the bloc’s historic €1.8tn (£1.6tn) budget and coronavirus recovery plan over attempts to link funding to respect for democratic norms.
The move unravels months of negotiations over the scale and terms of the EU’s spending and sets the stage for a stormy videoconference meeting of the bloc’s leaders on Thursday.
(01.11.2020)
The Sunday Telegraph can disclose, as advisers to the presidential hopeful revealed that he plans to focus on rebuilding America’s relations with the European Union.
One influential foreign policy adviser to Mr Biden told an audience in Germany last week that, if elected, the former vice-president would quickly issue a „declaration of support for the European Union“ and „European integration“.
#rightthingtodo
The former leaders, both vehement opponents of Brexit, said that respecting treaty obligations was „just as important“ as domestic law, and called for MPs to reject the legislation.
„As the world looks on aghast at the UK – the word of which was once accepted as inviolable – this government’s action is shaming itself and embarrassing our nation,“ they added.
The UK ‚cannot compromise on the fundamentals of what it means to be an independent country‘
(10.04.2020)
Thursday’s Eurogroup agreement promised Italy loans to deal with the health care costs of coronavirus — but refused to help it stave off economic catastrophe. EU leaders have once again put neoliberal dogmas above the welfare of ordinary citizens — further undermining Italians’ once-dogged pro-Europeanism.
(12.04.2020)
„It has been like this for years.“
The Italian politician added: „What Germany is doing is disgusting and I believe that the EU will look very different when this virus is over.
„The UK could have not made a better decision in leaving this bloc.“
(29.03.2020)
Conte said anybody who thinks they can force Italy to accept disciplinary terms as a condition for loans – a sort of „Troika“ regime – have gravely misjudged the mood of his nation. Italy will not take the money. “We will do it alone,” he said.
The message is that if there is no EU solidarity when it matters, then it no longer makes sense for Italy to accept EU surveillance and constraints, or for Italy to forgo use of its own sovereign policy instruments in self-defence.
(30.03.2020)
Article by Heiko Maas, Federal Minister of Foreign Affairs, and Olaf Scholz, Federal Minister of Finance, on the corona crisis in Europe. Published April 6th, 2020, in different language versions in Les Echos (France), La Stampa (Italy), El País (Spain), Público (Portugal) and Ta Nea (Greece).
Germany, for example, caused outrage in Austria and Switzerland by stopping shipments of face masks to its neighbors. Several states have export restrictions, usually hidden in impenetrable legalese, on medical equipment from goggles to gloves and ventilators. Italy, in particular, feels let down. When it first tried to invoke an EU mechanism to share medical supplies, no member state helped. Ironically, only China sent equipment.
For the European Union and the new team at its executive arm, the European Commission, led by Ursula von der Leyen, this pandemic is a challenge to her intention to have a “geopolitical commission,’’ Ms. Stelzenmüller said — ‘‘if the member states let her.”
Brexit is a „historic warning sign“ for the European Union, French President Emmanuel Macron said hours before Britain’s departure from the EU, adding that it meant „we need more Europe“.
Yet there is also an enormous danger in doing nothing. Imagine if Brexit does not reduce Britain to misery but instead leaves the country relatively unscathed. In that case, the very idea of Europe — that the combined power of many states results in more power for the individual state — could suffer another major blow.
And this time, it could be terminal.
The United Kingdom had been trying to join the European Economic Community since 1961, but had been rejected twice by French President Charles de Gaulle, who argued that Britain was “incompatible” and harboured a “deep-seated hostility” to any pan-European project.
Once de Gaulle stepped down in 1969, the way was clear for the UK to enter the club on the third time of trying.
Forty-seven years and 30 days after we joined. Three decades since the rot set in with the drive towards a United States of Europe. Seven years after David Cameron promised a referendum and 3½ traumatic years since Leave won it. It is hard to exaggerate the magnitude of this moment.
Monday January 1, 1973, the day we joined the Common Market, was cold and foggy. Ironically, planes could not fly to the Continent because airports were closed by the weather. But the spirits of the nation were lifted by our entry into the European Economic Community (EEC) after 15 years of knocking on the door. …
UK Labour
Lowest seats since 1935
Austria
Lowest since 1945
Germany
2nd lowest since 1949
France
Lowest ever
Italy
Lowest ever
Netherlands
Lowest ever
Sweden
Lowest since 1908
Finland
2nd lowest since 1962
Maybe it’s not just about Brexit?
Very recently it was common to hear people ask, with a genuine puzzlement, what had happened to the prospect of a mildly centrist, progressive, pro-European political force. The December 2019 election has shattered that possibility, perhaps for ever. The Blairites in the Labour Party are a tiny, uninfluential rump. Their vocal media cheerleaders are an anachronism. The Europhile progressives who quit their parties have been everywhere rejected, not least because of Britain’s brutal first-past-the-post voting system. The Liberal Democrats have been decapitated.
But beyond the current lack of individual leaders, there is a yawning gap of vision.
The arrogance and detachment of Corbyn’s middle class fan club was a factor in every seat that Labour lost. And they were so away with the fairies that in a Bassetlaw they predicted a 1200 Labour majority on the eve of the election.
It is 95 years since Bassetlaw last elected a Conservative…
Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson lost her East Dunbartonshire seat after 12 years of being the serving MP.
Every former Conservative and Labour MP who quit the parties in protest over issues including Brexit and anti-Semitism has failed to be re-elected.
Jeremy Corbyn has been re-elected in Islington North. But after leading his party to a second election loss, the Labour leader also announced that he would stand down before the next campaign.
Increasing wages increases consumption. Because 22% of consumption is imported in Germany – and because increasing wages doesn’t increase exports: if anything, the opposite – Germans having more money in their pockets will lead to them buying more foreign goods, reducing the current account surplus.
This won’t be easy to execute. There is a deep bipartisan consensus in Germany to maintain the status quo.
James Forsyth writes in this issue’s cover article that the Remain side’s inability to unite may well cost them this election and, if Boris Johnson wins, put the last nail in the coffin for Remain. On the podcast, Alastair Campbell also explains why the People’s Vote campaign seems to have imploded in recent weeks.
Talks have been under way between the unashamedly pro-EU Lib Dems, Plaid Cymru and the Greens maximise their chances in key constituencies in the December 12 election.
The pact would see two of the three parties stand aside to favour the one with the best chance of victory – replicating the success in the Brecon and Radnorshire by-election.
Paul Embery talks to Brendan O’Neill about Brexit, democracy and the scourge of wokeness.
Instead of growing the economy by state backing and export-led growth as competitors have done, we’re left behind clinging to a protectionist bloc designed to protect French agriculture and German manufacturing at our expense.
We want to stay in the Single Market but ignore the fact that we’re running a £100 billion trade deficit in goods with it. That means the export of jobs, money and economic demand primarily to Germany.
The candidate claimed that Brexit is causing divisions that have “split families and friends have led to huge rises in violent crime on our streets and domestic abuse in our homes.” He went on to say:
“We have to stop this – just as we stopped the Nazis in Germany and their sympathizers in this country at the time from destroying this country in the 1930s.”
(24.09.2019)
At a speech at the UK’s Liberal Democrat party conference, leading EU Parliament member Guy Verhofstadt was met with thunderous applause after he proclaimed the end of the nation-state and declared the future will be based on the interactions of empires.
“In the world order of tomorrow, the world order of tomorrow is not a world order based on nation states or countries, it’s a world order that is based on Empires, China is not a nation, it’s a civilisation.
If Labour wins the next election, it will hold a second referendum. The choice would be between staying in the EU and ‘leaving’ via a tweaked version of Theresa May’s withdrawal deal – that is, between Remain and Remain By Another Name. Whoever wins that rigged referendum, Brexit would lose. This internal spat is over which flavour of betrayal to recommend to the electorate, and when might be best to announce that preference.
Amid stormy scenes in the hall, Labour delegates then approved so-called composite motion 14 – which again supported Mr Corbyn’s Brexit position while not committing the party to pursue a particular view at a second Brexit referendum.
Amid intense behind-the-scenes arm-twisting today, public services union Unison broke ranks to declared it will oppose the leader’s Brexit fudge.
But the Momentum pressure group appears to have handed Mr Corbyn a lifeline by signalling its activists will be in his camp, rather than with the Remainers.
In a shock split, its founder Jon Lansman made clear he did not agree with the decision, tweeting that ‚members should feel free to vote with their conscience‘.
A source close to Corbyn tells me he expects the block vote of the unions to defeat that motion on Monday when put to conference, although another source told me the two giant unions, Unison and Unite, are no longer as one and Unison may peel away from Unite and abstain.
Above the shoulder of every speaker at Labour Party conference reads a slogan: “For the many, not the few.” For decades, this has been Labour’s promise, but this week will show just how hollow their words ring.
David Starkey talks to Brendan O’Neill about the ‘lying, deceiving shits’ in the establishment.
Guy Verhofstadt’s speech at the conference of the UK Liberal Democrats September 14h, 2019.
Every Monday, a group of unlikely bedfellows meet in Jeremy Corbyn’s parliamentary office. Jo Swinson, Liberal Democrat leader; Ian Blackford, the SNP’s Westminster leader; Caroline Lucas, the Green party’s sole MP; and Liz Saville Roberts from Plaid Cymru all gather to discuss their common aim — preventing a no-deal Brexit. This rebel alliance is more than just a group therapy session: last week, they succeeded in taking control of parliament and immediately started to give instructions to the Prime Minister.
A leaked shortlist for the next Governor of the Bank of England made its way from the highest levels of the Treasury to the pages of The Times last Saturday, and has now been followed up by an orchestrated letter signed by Remain supporting MPs. The letter is a not-so-subtle attempt to confirm the leak by making the Civil Service’s recommendation list public and therefore making it politically harder for the Chancellor to appoint a Brexiteer to the role.
– Jeremy Corbyn delivered hard-Left attack on Boris Johnson in speech at TUC
– He said that the PM wanted a Brexit settlement to benefit his ‚wealthy friends‘
– Union baron Len McCluskey sent class war message ‚workers are coming for you‘
Labour MPs started singing revolutionary anthem The Red Flag after Scottish and Welsh nationalists sang Flower Of Scotland and Bread Of Heaven.
The extraordinary scenes erupted as the Commons session was closed down shortly before 2am by the prorogation order, recommended to the Queen by the Prime Minister, in an act most MPs believe was intended to prevent Parliament having a say over Brexit. Minutes earlier, Mr Johnson suffered his sixth Commons defeat when MPs failed to back his call for a snap general election.
Amber Rudd deported innocent black Britons but is still beloved by migrant-loving Remoaners.
This furious, anti-democratic wing of the elite, who make up the majority of the contemporary establishment, has been drifting towards extreme authoritarianism for two years now. They openly discuss overriding the largest democratic vote in British history. They condemn newspapers that use strong language to describe Remainer extremism. They make deals with the European Union above the heads of the prime minister, the Cabinet and the people to ensure that we stay in the EU for longer than planned. And now they warn the PM that if he doesn’t follow a new law insisting on an extension of the Article 50 process – and of the UK’s membership of the EU – then he will go to jail.
Mrs May has raised the issue directly with Party chairman James Cleverly and Chief Whip Mark Spencer on behalf of the group that includes former Chancellor Philip Hammond, ex-Justice Secretary David Gauke and Tory grandee Ken Clarke.
She approached Mr Cleverly behind the Speaker’s Chair in the House of Commons on Wednesday evening to raise concerns about the legality of blocking any of the rebels from being candidates at the next Election.
Under the plan, if the rebels are not allowed back into the party, the Liberals and the Greens would not put up a candidate against MPs Rory Stewart, Sam Gyimah, Margot James and Dominic Grieve.
In return, if they were to beat the official Tory candidates and win election to the Commons, they would agree to take a ’soft whip‘ from the Liberals, meaning they would vote with Ms Swinson’s party on selected issues.
Jeremy Corbyn is paving the way for a “zombie Parliament”, senior Conservatives have said as Leave voters accused MPs of “squabbling like children”.
We thought Remoaners could sink no lower. We were wrong.
Labour, the Lib Dems, the SNP and Plaid Cymru say they will vote against the government or abstain in Monday’s vote on whether to hold a snap poll.
– Labour and SNP chiefs met last night to agree a pact to prevent No Deal Brexit
– Jeremy Corbyn and Ian Blackford said to have agreed no election before Oct 20
– Senior colleagues are petitioning Mr Corbyn to seek an election in November
– Sources say it is because Labour MPs do not think they could win a snap election
– Mr Johnson said he would rather ‚die in a ditch‘ than ask the EU for an extension
Let us be quite clear. The rearguard campaign to prevent a “no-deal” Brexit is merely a smokescreen for the real objective, which is to frustrate any Brexit at all and, in effect, overturn the referendum outcome.
The bogus Labour party and Blairite forces are sabotaging British democracy
When MPs who once vowed to honour the referendum result vote instead to proceed with a dodgy Bill, enabled by their puppet Speaker, surrendering power to the EU to determine a delay of its choosing — to be rubber-stamped by our Remainer-dominated Parliament.
Will three months suit Brussels? Six, maybe? How about ten years?
Remainers will, have no doubt, sign off whatever the EU decides.
– Boris Johnson called for snap election after being defeated by Remainer MPs
– The PM needs to secure a two-thirds vote in the Commons to hold an early poll
– Jeremy Corbyn has said he will block poll unless law is passed against No Deal
Jeremy Corbyn, the scourge of bankers and avowed opponent of capitalism, is winning support from unexpected new quarters: two of the biggest global banks operating in the City of London are warming to the Labour leader.
Unlikely as it may seem, he is now seen as the lesser of two evils by analysts at Citibank and Deutsche Bank, respectively American and German titans of the financial system.
The leader of the opposition, Jeremy Corbyn has said that there is no consent to leave the EU without a deal and no majority for no-deal in the country.
He added that if Prime Minister Boris Johnson wants to table a motion for a general election he should „get the bill passed first in order to take no-deal off the table“.
The political class has taken back control – from the people.
The lawmakers who voted in favor of the motion include a number of high-profile rebels in Johnson’s own Conservative Party, who now risk being stripped of their affiliation. Parliament on Wednesday will vote on a bill to force Johnson to seek a Brexit extension from the European Union.
Section 3, Paragraph 1 has already caught the attention of Brexiteers, as it would mean the EU can choose the length of the extension – without a limit – and the Prime Minister must agree to it.
Those who have been quite happy to see power drip from Westminster to Brussels are now enthusiastic converts to parliamentary sovereignty. Of course, the brand of democracy that’s fashionable with EU-loving protesters is of a very specific variety. It’s the type that places the votes of a few hundred MPs above the 17.4million members of the public who voted for the UK to leave the EU. It’s the type of democracy that demands we bend the knee to our representatives in parliament, who are expected to think and act on our behalf.
They are expected to put forward legislation on Tuesday to stop no deal under „SO24“ or Standing Order 24 – the rule allowing MPs to ask for a debate on a „specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration“.
Sources have told the BBC the bill would force the prime minister to seek a three-month extension until 31 January if no withdrawal deal has been passed by 19 October – the day after the next EU leaders‘ summit.
Remainers have had a painful reminder of what happens when they forget Mike Tyson’s cardinal rule:: „Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.“
How many times does this need to be restated? Germany desperately needs to change its economic model, now more so than ever as its own economy, that of the European Union, and the world as a whole, again teeter on the brink of recession.
Most of all, it needs to make itself more reliant on internal, domestic demand, and less on exports.
Jeremy Corbyn secured the support of five other parties yesterday in his bid to further delay Britain’s departure from the EU.
The five other leaders had forced the Labour leader to drop his preferred option of tabling a vote of no confidence.
Instead, the opposition groups agreed to prioritise passing a law to extend Article 50 again.
Even the civil servants seem suddenly to be standing straighter. After three years of immobilism, dreariness and funk, the Government is again exuding purpose.
So, while the EU might well be the apogee of constrained democracy, constrained democracy has many facets. Moreover, the model of constrained democracy existed on a national level before the EU was created. Indeed, the EU can be seen as the grotesque extension of a flawed system that was first developed within nation states after the First World War. For instance, the model of independent central banking was pioneered in Germany before being transposed to the EU much later on.
President Sergio Mattarella wants a government deal in the coming days.
Otherwise Italy faces new elections.
Former Tory former cabinet ministers Iain Duncan Smith and Owen Paterson claimed the leak of documents on ‚Operation Yellowhammer‘ was an example of the ‚establishment‘ plot to ’sow fear in people’s minds‘.
In a joint statement, they said: ‚This Operation Yellowhammer leak is the version of what the contingency executive put together. We remember attending a briefing on privy council terms which they said was not worst case but reasonable worst case. Theresa May had asked for this to be done. It was obviously Project Fear dressed up.
– A secret Whitehall dossier outlines possible pandemonium in a No Deal Brexit
– Operation Yellowhammer casts a dark shadow over proposed October 31 exit
– Hard border in Ireland, fuel, medicine and food shortages are anticipated
– News comes as Boris Johnson prepares to meet EU leaders at the G7 this week
As things stand, what you can and cannot say on the internet is largely a matter for national law, decided by national parliaments. This means that every nation in Europe currently has different laws and practices.
But the EU has quietly been moving to change this. Take last year’s Copyright Directive, which more or less demands the introduction of automated content filters on social-media platforms. And last month, it became clear that an impatient Brussels wants to turbocharge this process by bringing internet regulation to the EU level, where it can pull the necessary strings.
Today is the 200th anniversary of the Peterloo Massacre, when working people in Manchester were attacked and murdered by cavalry forces for daring to demand the right to vote. And what is our political class doing on this anniversary of such an important event in British political history? They are plotting, tirelessly, to overthrow something that millions of working-class people, and others, voted for: Brexit.
The paper was prepared by civil servants for the German finance minister, Olaf Scholz, ahead of face-to-face talks with the chancellor of the exchequer, Sajid Javid, in Berlin on Friday.
Former Cabinet ministers Dominic Grieve and David Gauke both distanced themselves from the Labour’s leader’s cross-party call to back him in leading a „strictly time-limited“ government that would extend Article 50 and then call a general election.
Mr Grieve – who on Thursday agreed to sit down for talks with Mr Corbyn – said he would „not facilitate“ a government led by Mr Corbyn, according to a leaked email.
– Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has been accused of plotting a ‚desperate‘ coup
– He pleaded for support in bringing a no confidence vote to prevent No Deal
– Embarrassingly Mr Corbyn’s plans have been rejected by the Lib Dems already
Lucas, the ostensibly leftish leader of the Green Party, proposed forming an entirely undemocratic ‘emergency cabinet’ made up of her and her exclusively female chums. Its job would be to trash the thing that 17.4million of us voted for – leaving the EU. And how did the woke left respond to Lucas’s lunacy? By pointing out that her proposed cabinet consisted entirely of white women! Yes, it wasn’t the fact that Lucas was essentially proposing a coup against democracy that got the woke lobby’s back up – it was that there were no black faces in her clique against the masses.
Most important, the League leader will have to decide where he really stands on fundamental questions that he has dodged so far – from Italy’s economic policy to its place in the euro zone and the European Union. Before now he could blame his weak coalition partner, the Five Star leader Luigi Di Maio, or his technocratic finance minister Giovanni Tria for any difficulties. The easy ride is over.
It’s an index of the Left’s impotence that its main hope of stopping Matteo Salvini today lies in some sort of institutional “fix” to prevent early elections.
A proposed new agreement on dealing with failing banks, hammered out in a lengthy meeting of finance ministers, was headed for a summit of European leaders on Thursday. Described as an „historic achievement“ by Italian Economy Minister Fabrizio Saccomanni, the single-resolution mechanism (SRM) agency is designed to prevent failures like the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008. Ban
As the world turns medieval, clinging to Brussels will only spell our demise
In supporting the European banking union, Germany’s highest court reveals its anti-democratic heart.
Boris Johnson, the UK’s new prime minister, wants you to know that he loves his country.
Specifically, he wants you to know that he loves the Union between the four nations that make up the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
Unfortunately for Johnson, this love is not always reciprocated.
Great strategists are unpredictable strategists. So it has been exhilarating to watch Boris Johnson hurl the lightning bolts of shock-and-awe regime change through Britain’s May-grey political skies with such unexpected ruthlessness. Since becoming PM, he has surprised everyone from paranoid Brexiteers to complacent centrists by forming a serious no-deal Cabinet and bellowing for the “abolition” of the backstop from the despatch box.
Of course, such unpredictability is anathema to homo bureaucratus, that snarling, slow-witted behemoth in Brussels that Mr Johnson must take on.
(24.06.2016)
Brexit has created the potential greater democratic control of trade deals. And we must ensure we use that to craft a trade policy that is geared to justice for the many rather than profits for the few.
The party’s deputy leader defeated rival Sir Ed Davey in the race to succeed Sir Vince Cable.
Ms Swinson, the MP for East Dunbartonshire, received 47,997 votes, comfortably ahead of her rival on 28,021.
‘Remain and Reform.’ That’s been the mantra of the anti-Brexit left and second-referendum campaigners since the UK’s historic vote to leave the EU. Now that the Labour Party has shamefully turned its back on Brexit and is campaigning for the overthrow of the largest democratic vote in UK history, it has been forced to adopt a Remain and Reform agenda.
Ursula von der Leyen has been confirmed as the next president of the EU Commission, winning a vote in the European Parliament by 383 to 327.
But despite the involvement of MEPs, the process that put von der Leyen in place was nothing short of a coronation.
On the biggest issue in British politics, Labour promised one thing before the election and then did the complete opposite afterwards. The last party that performed such an outrageous U-turn was the Liberal Democrats over tuition fees, and they were rightly destroyed in the following election.
Labour is now possibly facing that same oblivion.
As of this morning, just under five million Labour Leave voters are homeless. I’m sure The Brexit Party will be delighted.
Already Labour are below 20 per cent in some general election polls and it is hard to see how they will survive a four-way squeeze in any snap election.
The only thing that might avoid this doomsday scenario is if the Tories manage to take the UK out of the EU by 31st October. Given that the dreadful withdrawal agreement is now dead in the water, that means, somewhat ironically, only a ‘no deal’ Brexit can save Labour.
Ursula von der Leyen, the woman nominated as the new president of the European Commission, has warned the next prime minister of Britain over the “tone and attitude” of Brexit.
Today is a tragic day in the Labour Party’s history, and a fatal day for British democracy. It is, potentially, the beginning of the end of the Labour Party as we know it.
In backing Remain, Corbyn has turned Labour into an authoritarian tool of the establishment.
In a bombshell announcement Jeremy Corbyn said today that his party will back another divisive vote to stop Brexit – as long as the Tories are still in power.
After years of flip-flopping on the issue, he said that no matter what Brexit deal the next PM gets with the EU, they should put it back to the people for another say.
However his message, which came during a day of meetings with senior party figures, raised fresh questions over Labour’s Brexit strategy in a general election.
It comes as attempts to stop the next prime minister forcing through a no-deal Brexit by Halloween were rejected by the deputy speaker.
Overall that’s over £225,000 Hunt’s backers have donated to anti-Brexit campaigns, parties and politicians, before sticking their financial clout behind him. Tory members might well be wondering what he’s telling his hardline Remain donors that he isn’t telling them…
Get real. For the first time in a hundred years, Labour faces a working-class electorate that it doesn’t understand and doesn’t know. Too many Labour MPs talk about the working class as if they were in need of social workers, not representatives. They should get real: it is the Labour party that has left the working class rather than the working class that has left the party;
On Thursday, for the first time ever, it fell to fourth place in an opinion poll. But just when you thought that this week would see yet another dismal chapter of Corbyn is Even More Useless Than the Useless Tories, in stepped the magnificent Ann Widdecombe.
„My aim is the United States of Europe — modelled on federal states like Switzerland, Germany or the U.S.,“ she told Der Spiegel in 2011. She repeated her call for a federal EU in an interview with Die Zeit in 2016, adding: „I imagine the Europe of my children or grandchildren not as a loose union of states trapped by national interests.“
As defense minister, she pushed for greater security cooperation in the EU, urging a „defense union“ and calling for the establishment of an „army of Europeans.“
Thank you, Eurocrats, for being yourselves. The best cure for Europhilia is always to observe the EU’s big beasts at their unguarded worst, wheeling and dealing in their natural habitat, unencumbered by any attachment to democracy, accountability or even basic morality.
The spectacle of the past few days made for compulsive watching: we witnessed rare footage of the secretive process that propels so many retreads and second-rate apparatchiks into positions of immense power in Brussels and Frankfurt, utterly disregarding public opinion.
(28.06.2019)
France’s top contender for the presidency of the European Central Bank is appealing to Germans to treat him as one of their kind.
Speaking — in German — to an audience of family businesses in Berlin on Friday, Bank of France Governor Francois Villeroy de Galhau highlighted his cultural and ideological links to the country. He said he shares German values, such as solidity, stability and realism, and understands the nation’s fears over financing other countries’ debts.
The European Union flag is omnipresent in Germany. Since 2011, it has even been flying over the Reichstag – a sign, as one newspaper put it at the time, of the strength of the German political class’s commitment to the EU.
But not everyone in Germany shares this commitment.
A senior Labour source told The Times that Mr Corbyn was supporting the policy change.
The new policy paper has been written by Andrew Fisher, Mr Corbyn’s head of policy, and suggests a second referendum on any deal negotiated with Brussels.
As it stands Labour currently is asking the government for a custom’s union or a general election.
(09.06.2019)
The foreign secretary said he had spoken to the German chancellor on the sidelines of D-day commemorations last week and she had indicated that the EU was “willing to negotiate on the package” if a new prime minister had the “right approach”.
Im Rennen um das Amt des Tory-Parteichefs hat ein weiterer Kandidat seine Bewerbung zurückgezogen: Gesundheitsminister Hancock sich aus dem Rennen zurück. Damit ist das Bewerberfeld auf sechs geschrumpft.
Paul Embery @ Leave Means Leave March, 29th March.
Paul Embery has spent 20 years as a dedicated trade-union official, fighting for better rights, conditions and pay for firefighters with the Fire Brigades Union. But today he revealed that he has been kicked off the union’s national executive and banned from office for two years.
Why? Because he delivered a pro-Brexit speech at the Leave Means Leave rally outside parliament on the day we were supposed to leave the EU.
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More below.
Put simply, there seems to be only one side which cares about the future of our democracy and, ironically, it’s the side that keeps being labelled ‘fascist’.
He said: „In the aftermath of the local elections and particularly the EU elections, there are many in the Labour party who feel we need to be very clear about a second referendum and about making the case for Remain.
„That’s certainly what I’m advocating, discussions are going on at the moment, I hope we can resolve it pretty soon, and that will be a material step in the right direction as far as I’m concerned.“
– Boris Johnson will formally set out his stall for the leadership of his party today
– But Opposition MPs have tabled a motion to take control of Parliament and potentially pass legislation taking No Deal off the table
– Johnson has staked his leadership bid on a promise the UK will leave the UK with or without a deal on October 31
– Leadership outsiders Andrea Leadsom, Rory Stewart and Mark Harper launched their campaigns yesterday
– Michael Gove stepped up his attack on Johnson’s tax plans, calling them ‚insane‘
– European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker said Brussels will not renegotiate the Brexit deal, regardless of who replaces Mrs May
For Streeck this is all evidence that the Left, broadly defined, is losing its soul to the European project:
“There is not even a debate on the crucial issue of whether the EU can at all be a vehicle for anti-capitalist politics. Instead, there is a naïve or opportunistic acceptance — and it’s hard to say which is worse — of the feel-good ‘Europeanism’ so popular among young people and so useful for both Green electioneering and European technocrats seeking legitimacy for their neoliberal regime.”
Let me restate that: William Barr is opposed to certain, very narrow subsets of domestic surveillance. Specifically, Barr doesn’t think the government should have spied on Trump and his campaign staff, if that’s what actually happened, which Barr doesn’t actually seem to know.
But if you’re literally anyone else, domestic surveillance is just another name for national security, whether you’re a random Verizon customer or one of the world’s most useful websites.
The Wikimedia Foundation sued the federal government over domestic surveillance back in 2015. The suit lives on four years later …
Today, EU Member States agreed to give two mandates to the Commission to engage in international negotiations to improve cross-border access to electronic evidence in criminal investigations.The Council agreed to provide the Commission with negotiating mandates for negotiations with the United States and for the Second Additional Protocol to the Council of Europe “Budapest” Convention on Cybercrime.
Change UK has spit with six of its 11 MPs quitting the party.
Interim leader Heidi Allen has left the party, alongside Sarah Wollaston, Luciana Berger, Gavin Shuker, Angela Smith and Chuka Umunna.
Anna Soubry has been appointed the party’s new leader.
One of the most striking but neglected outcomes of the European election last week was the complete collapse of the Labour Party in traditional Labour territory. From Ashfield to Redcar, Merthyr Tydfil to Middlesbrough, Barnsley to Bolsover, most of Britain’s working-class and pro-Brexit areas abandoned the traditional defender of the working class. Instead, they put their tick next to Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party, a party only launched six weeks earlier.
Someone needs to wake up and recognise that fact. Labour is preparing to abandon the North. It’s preparing to abandon millions of supporters who have helped sustain the party over generations.
And it’s about to create a political vacuum that will see what’s left of a once-proud party implode.
The Environment Secretary has told colleagues that a no-deal Brexit in October risks triggering a General Election that will put Jeremy Corbyn in Downing Street.
His position puts him directly at odds with other Brexiteer leadership candidates including Boris Johnson, the former foreign secretary, who have committed to leaving on time with or without a deal.
The Tory leadership contender has revealed a five-point plan on Brexit which he believes are an „honest, credible set of proposals that recognises the significant challenges we face“.
Mr Javid rules out holding another referendum or an early general election, says he will not revoke Article 50 and vows to ramp up preparations for No Deal if he becomes prime minister.
The currency has been criticized for making economic planning for the developing countries of French West Africa all but impossible since the CFA’s value is pegged to the euro (whose monetary policy is set by the European Central Bank).[3] Others disagree and argue that the CFA „helps stabilize the national currencies of Franc Zone member-countries and greatly facilitates the flow of exports and imports between France and the member-countries“.[4] The European Union’s own assessment of the CFA’s link to the euro, carried out in 2008, noted that „benefits from economic integration within each of the two monetary unions of the CFA franc zone, and even more so between them, remained remarkably low“ but that „the peg to the French franc and, since 1999, to the euro as exchange rate anchor is usually found to have had favourable effects in the region in terms of macroeconomic stability“
CFA franc. These two words probably do not mean much to most readers, but they encapsulate one of the world’s most enduring – and little-known – economic experiments. In the simplest possible terms, the CFA franc is a currency used by 14 countries of Western and Central Africa, all of which are former French colonies.
It had been a „challenging fundraising year“ for all parties, the Tories said.
The figures do not represent all donations, as only those above £7,500 have to be reported.
A no-deal scenario would do „severe“ damage to businesses, it said in an open letter to all the MPs running to lead the party.
Director general Carolyn Fairbairn warned them that smaller companies cannot afford the necessary preparations for leaving without a plan.
WON’T somebody rid us of this troublesome Speaker?
(30.06.2016)
– Boris Johnson abandons ambitions of becoming PM after Michael Gove drops him and launches own campaign
– Justice Secretary says Johnson was not up to job and questions if his ‚heart and soul‘ were in pushing through Brexit
– Boris aide said to have vented anger at Gove in expletive-laden text accusing him of plotting to win keys to No10
– Furious Conservative MP Jake Berry says on Twitter that there is a ‚very deep pit reserved in Hell‘ for Gove
– Alliance between Leave campaigners ripped up as Treasury minister Andrea Leadsom enters Tory contest
– Home Secretary Theresa May installed as favourite after delivering bravura performance at her launch
This time next year, will Boris Johnson be installed in No 10 as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and First Lord of the Treasury?
Or will he be detained at Her Majesty’s pleasure, dispensing coffee in the prison canteen and running journalism lessons for fellow jailbirds while waiting for his next visit from the ever-loyal Jacob Rees-Mogg?
I suppose the first outcome is rather more likely.
Marcus Ball, a Remain-backing campaigner, took out a private prosecution against Mr Johnson, claiming he was wrong to say during the EU referendum campaign that Britain gives £350 million a week to Brussels.
The Foreign Secretary, a Tory leadership candidate, refused to commit to taking the UK out of the EU before the October 31 deadline but said the bloc would back down because they do not want the “shadow of Brexit hanging over them”.
The pro-EU parties crumbled – but a coherent Eurosceptic force is sorely lacking.
John Bercow may not be Brexiteers‘ favourite as Speaker as the House of Commons, but he has sought to live up to the spirit of Brexit by constantly letting the expected deadline for his departure slip.
Mr Bercow had reportedly told friends he was planning to stand down in the summer, having spent 10 years in the post.
On Fox News last night, Mr Farage vowed: ‚If we do not leave the European Union on October 31, I will lead the Brexit Party after that into the next general election and we will sweep away parties that have dominated British politics for over 100 years.‘