10 quotes that show what Europe really thinks of Brexit Britain

(PA Wire/PA Images) - Credit: PA Wire/PA Images

*Spoiler* It’s not great

1. ‘It will take all the ‘stiff upper lip’ symbolized by Queen Victoria to overcome the economic storm unleashed from the British leaving the European Union’ – La Stampa, Italian newspaper

2. ‘The recent resignation of Sir Ivan Rogers as permanent representative to the EU is not merely a diplomatic anecdote. It is a categorical symbol of Brexit’s self-destructive capacity for the United Kingdom’ – el Pais, Spanish newspaper

3. ‘Great Britain will have to adjust to less growth, higher prices and more debt’ – Bild, German newspaper

4. ‘If the Government under Theresa May continues to be so amateurish about Brexit, the whole EU will suffer. There are strong interests in a continued partnership with London. But it takes a plan, compromise, and, above all, a sense of reality’ – Die Presse, Austrian newspaper

5. ‘The British government has still no clear Brexit plan. Prime Minister Theresa May is concerned with numerous side issues involved, but has no control over the final strategy’ – De Telegraff, Dutch newspaper

6. ‘Welcome to hell,’ – Belgian politician and former PM, Guy Verhofstadt welcoming David Davis to the negotiation table

7. ‘I haven’t heard anything new, of how the British government wants to tackle it [Brexit] […] In the coming weeks we will have to look at a much clearer negotiating process, we need a clear position from the British government’ – Manfred Weber, leader of the European People’s Party group in the EU parliament

8. ‘One cannot lead these [Brexit] negotiations based in the form of ‘cherry picking” – Angela Merkel

9. ‘[Boris Johnson should] read about the fact that there’s a certain connection between the single market and the four freedoms. at a pinch, I could talk about it in english’ – German finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble dismisses the foreign secretary’s description of the link between single market access and freedom of movement as ‘baloney’

10. ‘The British are testing us – we all know that. They are testing how united Europe is. So what is important is that Europe stays together. no bilateral negotiations with the British. no cherry-picking. We are doing this as a bloc’ – German MEP David Mcallister