News and Opinion

A breakfast television host told Jacob Rees-Mogg that it was the ‘fault of Brexiteers’ that there was stalemate with the Brexit process. Without a hint of irony the arch Brexiteer told Good Morning Britian that the House of Commons seems to know more about what it does not want than what it does want. He […]

Tim Walker finds Pinter’s Party Time and Celebration to be an unexpected pleasure. It is hard as a theatre critic not to take almost as much pleasure in the hatreds as the enthusiasms. Over two decades of reviewing, I have seldom, if ever, had a good word to say about Harold Pinter. His work always […]

Labour MP Chuka Umunna, a backer of the People’s Vote campaign, has said his party should commit to a People’s Vote by the end of this week. Speaking at College Green, he said he expects a ‘heavy defeat’ for Theresa May’s deal ahead of a vote of no confidence vote. ‘It’s probably unlikely that the […]

The former Brexit secretary also admitted making money betting on the outcome of the referendum. Davis, 70, told the German news magazine Der Spiegel that there had been a ‘fierce debate’ over the disastrous 1956 invasion of Egypt just as there had over Brexit but insisted it would settle back down. Asked whether Britain turning […]

A German comedy sketch has mocked Britain by portraying characters representing the Brexit debate in an escape room – unable to get out because they will not work together. The sketch, which appeared on public television channel NDR, is a flavour of how the rest of Europe views Brexit Britain. In the stint, as the […]

An exasperated Dutch MEP has said the problems surrounding Brexit are entirely the problem of the UK because it ‘does not know what it wants’. Sophie in’t Veld, one of the leaders of the liberal grouping in the European Parliament in Strasbourg, said that Brexiteers and certain parts of the media had tried to ‘shift […]

Don’t expect to discover great depths in the paintings of Winston Churchill, but you will find the qualities that helped make him excel in other areas. Benjamin Ivry reports. View of Monte Carlo and Monaco, circa 1930 – Credit: Archant Winston Churchill has been unavoidably compared to Adolf Hitler, insofar as both were drawn to […]

Environment secretary Michael Gove has channelled the popular television fantasy drama Game Of Thrones when he discussed alternatives to Theresa May’s deal. He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘If we don’t vote for the deal tonight, in the words of Jon Snow, ‘winter is coming’. ‘I think if we don’t vote for the deal […]

Former speaker Baroness Boothroyd delivered a powerful speech as she rejected Theresa May’s Brexit plan and called for MPs to support a People’s Vote. The former Labour MP, speaker and cross-bench peer said she had watched the Conservatives tear themselves apart over Europe before, but now the wounds were deeper under a leader who had […]

Philip Hammond has argued that leaving the European Union without a deal would be a ‘betrayal’ of the 2016 Brexit vote. The chancellor told MPs the Leave vote was fought on the ‘promise of greater prosperity’ and said a no-deal Brexit would not deliver that. Hammond, wrapping up the seventh day of debate on Theresa […]

Polling by Hope Not Hate and Best for Britain has found that 60% of the public back a fresh referendum if MPs are unable to decide on Brexit. For the first time, the polling – carried out in mid-December and early January – found a majority in favour of a second referendum in every part […]

A new song stakes a claim to be the first rock ‘n’ roll single, while music elsewhere plays catch-up. SOPHIA DEBOICK reports The mood was ambivalent in Britain in 1951. In one sense it seemed every aspect of life was changing and straining towards the future, but in another the country was still in wartime […]

The head of a national farming union has warned Britain will not be able to feed itself without the help of seasonal non-UK labour after Brexit. NFU Scotland president Andrew McCornick said Scotland and the UK are ‘getting thrown into a meltdown situation as far as labour is concerned’, regardless of a deal or no-deal […]

Readers of The New European give their verdict on Channel 4’s Brexit film. Forgive me if I don’t join the chorus of approval for Brexit: The Uncivil War. As well as lying about the £350 million and Turkey, Vote Leave broke electoral rules and have been referred to the police by the Electoral Commission. They […]

Theresa May has issued a last-ditch plea for MPs to back her Brexit deal, after Brussels chiefs issued a letter offering assurances that they do not want the controversial ‘backstop’ to be permanent. Speaking in a factory in Leave-voting Stoke-on-Trent, the prime minister said the letter from European Council president Donald Tusk and European Commission […]

A pizza shop has offered a large discount on pizzas to those who have written to their MPs in support of a People’s Vote. All Pizzeria Apollo in Diane Abbott’s constituency of Hackney North and Stoke Newington has announced that it will offer a 25% discount to those that have written a letter expressing their […]

JASON SOLOMONS talks to the British actor about her new film, her admiration for the pioneering Frenchwoman it is based on and why all her best parts are in period dramas. Keira Knightley and Dominic West star in Colette. Photo: Lionsgate. – Credit: Archant French writer Colette is perhaps not as well-known internationally as her […]

Cardiff have distanced themselves from manager Neil Warnock’s pro-Brexit remarks by saying his views do not represent that of the club. https://twitter.com/footballdaily/status/1084421049393893376 Warnock launched a fierce attack on the government’s failure to deliver on the 2016 referendum result after Saturday’s Premier League game against Huddersfield, saying he could not wait for the UK to leave […]

Boris Johnson has suggested he knows more about car manufacturing than the boss of Jaguar Land Rover. Speaking during a phone-in on LBC Radio, the former foreign secretary insisted Brexit would not damage the economy and said the industry had a strong future outside the EU. Johnson dismissed claims that recent job losses, including at […]

Esther McVey has scrapped with a news host after he suggested she was delusional for claiming that no deal concerns were ‘scare stories’. McVey told Sky News presenter Adam Boulton that if May loses the vote he should go back to the EU and demand a better deal for the £39 billion divorce bill, and […]

Theresa May is to use the vote for the Welsh Assembly as an example for backing Brexit – despite voting to block it in Parliament herself. The prime minister is set to use a speech in Stoke-on-Trent today to urge MPs to back her Brexit deal, using the referendum to establish the Assembly in Cardiff […]

Former prime minister Sir John Major has said revoking Article 50 – the process which would stop Brexit – is the ‘only sensible course’ for the UK. Sir John, who led the country between 1990 and 1997, wrote in the Sunday Times that he backs a People’s Vote and added that for the government to […]

Parliament is more likely to support staying in the EU than allowing the UK to crash out without a deal, Theresa May is set to say. The prime minister will use a speech on the eve of the critical House of Commons vote to urge MPs to consider the ‘consequences’ of their actions on the […]

Britain has slipped way behind other European countries in how it caters for cyclists. But, says CARLTON REID, there is still time to catch up. Brexit-besotted Brits may have voted – by a wafer-thin margin – to take the United Kingdom out of the European Union, but back in 2016 you wouldn’t have known it […]

The chances of a second referendum on membership of the European Union could greatly increase if a reported plot by MPs to take control of the Brexit agenda is successful, Liberal Democrat leader Sir Vince Cable has said. #Brexit: "Absolutely outrageous and unforgivable" if no-deal Brexit happens says Lib Dem leader Sir Vince Cable#marr https://t.co/Kyr1Li4hWc […]

A Norway-style Brexit could quickly gain in popularity should the prime minister’s Brexit deal flounder as expected in the House of Commons next week, a Conservative MP has said. Former minister Robert Halfon and Labour’s Lucy Powell have published a report outlining a ‘Common Market 2.0’ vision for a Norway-style Brexit. It would see the […]

As things begin to fall apart Bonnie Greer looks back at the late great writers who will define the next 12 months. Irish poet William Butler Yeats (1865 – 1939). (Photo by George C Beresford/Getty Images) – Credit: Getty Images Three writers come to mind at the beginning of this momentous year: two who seem […]

The Brexit deal MPs will vote on next week is a compromise deal that not everyone will be happy with, a leading Brexiteer member of the cabinet has admitted. Arch Brexiteer Chris Grayling insisted the deal prime minister Theresa May is putting to the House of Commons is a ‘sensible compromise’ but said it is […]

The chances of a no confidence vote in the government if the prime minister’s Brexit deal is rejected have been ramped up by Labour, with its leaders saying it is a case of ‘when, not if’. Labour shadow business secretary Rebecca Long-Bailey. Picture: STEFAN ROUSSEAU/PA – Credit: Archant However leader Jeremy Corbyn and shadow business […]

It is the question on everyone’s lips – what happens if, as expected, the government loses the key House of Commons vote on its Brexit plan next week? #Marr: Is there a Plan B if Theresa May's deal is voted down?#Brexit Secretary Stephen Barclay says the government is committed to the PM's deal & some […]

‘People need to get ready for this government to collapse in office’ – that is a leading left-wing economist’s prediction as the government heads towards defeat over its Brexit plan. Speaking on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show, former Newsnight journalist Paul Mason launched into the Tories for their divisions over Europe – saying: ‘The Tories […]

This week marks the centenary of the murder of Rosa Luxemburg. IAN WALKER pieces together the events which led up to it, and asks how her killing changed the course of the last century. circa 1919: Soldiers firing on loyalist officers in Berlin Castle from an armoured vehicle, during the Spartacist uprising in Berlin. (Photo […]