News and Opinion

Facebook has handed over details of scores of shifty online ads targeted at its users by Brexiteers during the EU referendum campaign. The messages, handed to a House of Commons committee inquiry into fake news, confirm that Vote Leave relied heavily on its lie – even described as “misleading” by the official statistician – that […]

Tim Walker exclusively reveals that Danny Boyle is to direct James Graham’s controversial Brexit drama… and asks is the Daily Mail’s Paul Dacre about to take charge of the Telegraph? Boyle set to direct Brexit The Movie Confounding the doubters, Danny Boyle made the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Summer Olympics a national and […]

Aren’t you sick of hearing the phrase ‘will of the people’? It has been parroted by Leavers since the EU referendum – but the Brexit decision neither represents the views of the UK nor is it likely to become so. Here are ten reasons why politicians and Brexiteers need to quit using it: 1. The […]

Police are having to deal with more racist hate crimes following a rise in offences around the EU referendum, figures show. The latest Home Office data shows an increase in the number hate crimes reported to the police, where race is the motivating factor, during the year of the Brexit vote. In the 2016-17 financial […]

Bregrets? We have a few… but now a top French politician has said the UK can come back to the EU – and all will be forgiven. French Europe minister, Nathalie Loiseau, told Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘We have always said, always, that the door would remain open and that we were not the ones […]

MICHAEL WHITE sees a glummer holiday ahead amid fears we may end up worse off than in the seventies. Though Ken Clarke, who was first elected an MP in the summer of 1970, says this is the craziest one he can remember at Westminster, I’m still not persuaded the Nearly Great Man is right. For […]

As Dad’s Army reaches 50, ANTHONY CLAVANE assesses what the show tells us about British exceptionalism, globalisation… and Brexit 20th August 1970: The cast of ‘Dad’s Army’, a popular tv series depicting the activities of the Home Guard, (from left) Clive Dunn, James Beck, John LeMesurier, Arthur Lowe, John Laurie, Ian Lavender and Arnold Ridley […]

Complacency’s about fascism’s return must end, says our editor-at-large. I mentioned last week that I have been reading a fair few books on fascism. I am clearly not alone. Former Labour leader Neil Kinnock, an avid, cover-to-cover reader of The New European, and as passionate as I am about the damage Brexit is doing to […]

STEVE ANGLESEY rounds-up the losers and the losers (because there are no winners) of another crazy seven days on Planet Brexit 10. HENRY BOLTON The former UKIP leader was upset by last week’s Brex Factor piece poking fun at Jo Marney for asking ‘would you like to go to India and for them to have […]

Former England striker Gary Lineker has declared blocking Brexit is more important to him than football as he backed a summer campaign for a fresh referendum. The Match Of The Day host said he has been left more bewildered and worried than ever after catching up on developments since returning from Russia following his coverage […]

TIM WALKER gives three stars to Alkaline at London’s Park Theatre Alkaline Park Theatre, London, until August 4 *** (Three stars) It is now more than half a century since Katharine Hepburn had to pluck up the courage to tell Spencer Tracy that their blonde-haired daughter was marrying Sidney Poitier in the film Guess Who’s […]

People who “undermine” the UK ‘through extreme EU loyalty’ should be tried for treason, a hardline Tory MEP has demanded. David Campbell Bannerman, a former Ukip deputy leader, made the astonishing call for thoughtcrimes to be prosecuted on Twitter, sparking accusations of “spiteful populist rhetoric”. He wrote: ‘It is about time we brought the Treason […]

Labour needs to set out a vision on Brexit that the whole country can get behind, says JOHN LEHAL Parliament may have risen for recess, but the Brexit secretary is already heading back to Brussels. This summer could well see the government’s chickens come home to roost. Far from a relaxing recess, the next few […]

Amid political stalemate a second referendum might be an idea whose time has come, writes BARNABY TOWNS With only 12% of voters backing the government’s ‘Chequers compromise’ in the latest poll, there are increasing calls for a People’s Vote, in which electors would be asked to choose either the government’s Brexit deal, assuming there is […]

A former chairman of Lloyd’s of London has written a letter tearing apart Brexiteer arguments and calling for “terrified” businesses and MPs to speak up. John Nelson, who was chairman of the insurance market from 2011 to last year said: “Never in 50 years of working life have I seen the UK facing such an […]

Sir Elton John has launched a blistering attack on Brexit and the ‘completely ridiculous’ promises made by Leavers. In a Channel 4 News interview the British singer claimed that those who backed Brexit did not know what they were voting for backing in June 2016. He claimed: ‘I don’t think people in Britain were told […]

‘Vote Leave,’ they said. ‘It’ll be great,’ they said. ‘We will give £350m a week to the NHS,’ they said. And the truth? Well, according to government plans to stockpile medicine, blood and even food are under way. Welcome to the sunlit uplands of Brexit folks. The first warning came from the new health secretary, […]

German culture’s enduring and changing relationship with the mythical Dr Faustus and his deal with the devil has coloured how the country views itself, says Ian Walker. Bin ich ein Gott? Mir wird so licht!’ (Am I a God? Light fills my mind); Goethe’s Faust The Faust myth – the story of a man who […]

Theresa May has announced she is to take control of negotiations with the EU, with Dominic Raab’s department effectively relegated to planning for no deal. Just 15 days after replacing David Davis as Brexit secretary – during which Mr Raab boasted he would use August to “intensify” and “get some energy into” talks – Mrs […]

It could be illegal to pay pensions to many retired British expats if the UK crashes out of the EU without a deal, the Association of British Insurers has told MPs. The trade association told members of the Commons Brexit committee that pensioners who receive their payments into bank accounts in their adopted countries could […]

MPs have warned lives are at risk if Britain crashes out of Europe without a deal. In a brutal assessment of preparations being made for security relations with the EU post-Brexit, the Commons Home Affairs Committee said both sides were behaving ‘recklessly’. The report pinpointed Theresa May’s decision to rule out European Court of Justice […]

Jeremy Corbyn has finally come clean over his views on Brexit. In a speech launching his plans to boost British manufacturing, the Labour leader made the extraordinary claim that there has already been a economic ‘benefit’ of Brexit. The address, which will outrage most Labour voters and MPs, also echoed Donald Trump’s protectionist policies by […]

A third of companies have shifted their contracts out of English courts’ jurisdiction since the Brexit vote, it emerged today. 35% of businesses say they had changed their contracts so that legal issues are heard in courts outside of England, according to new research, threatening its position as a world-leading centre for companies to resolve […]

A Tory minister has weirdly mocked calls for a People’s Vote on any Brexit deal by questioning if aliens or farm animals voted to leave the EU. Closing a House of Lords debate, Brexit minister Lord Callanan ridiculed the idea of a People’s Vote, asking “who voted in the first referendum, perhaps aliens or farm […]

Sacha Baron Cohen’s timely new comedy series offers clues as to how to cope with the blurring of truth and fiction in the era of Trump, says Leshu Torchin. The return of Sacha Baron Cohen (aka Ali G, Borat, and Brüno), comes just in time. His new satirical comedy series Who Is America? – filmed […]

The prime minister has revealed how she likes to relax after a day of managing Conservative Party feuds, promoting her Brexit plan, and trying to run the country. In the first leg of her new ‘Brexit tour’ Theresa May tried to restore public confidence in her abilities to negiogiate Brexit by attemping to show her […]

In an era of heightening global tensions, Martin Plaut finds an encouraging instance of two rivals burying the hatchet. He gives the inside story of an apparent instance of quickfire diplomacy Not long before Donald Trump’s eventful stay in the UK, another much-anticipated trip by a foreign leader to a nation with much shared history […]

Politics, pignappings, and prosecco… Charlie Connelly lifts the lid on the world of literary prizes – including his own track record. Kurt Vonnegut never won the Nobel Prize for Literature and he thought he knew why. He once managed a Saab dealership in Cape Cod that went to the wall, he explained before citing what […]

Billionaire business tycoon and Brexit basher Richard Branson has called leaving the EU a ‘tremendous mistake’ which is ‘already affecting the lives of my countrymen’. And he says he hopes the country has a last minute change of heart and votes against quitting. The Virgin Group founder was unveiling plans for new cruises under the […]

Deselecting the maverick MP is tempting, says Labour activist TESSA MILLIGAN, but won’t solve the hole at the heart of the party’s Brexit policy Kate Hoey is an anti-EU maverick. Being a backbencher gives her the freedom to vote on her conscience. Labour Party whips mean little to her, and nor do pairing agreements by […]

The only person who would welcome a no-deal Brexit is Russian president Vladimir Putin, new foreign secretary Jeremy Hunt has said. Mr Hunt said Mr Putin would rejoice if the UK and its allies failed to reach an agreement. His comments strike a different tone from predecessor Boris Johnson – who said a Brexit on […]

A leading government trade official was paid almost half a million pounds then quit before a single post-Brexit negotiation, it emerged today. Catherine Raines was paid a £62,800 ‘golden goodbye’ when she resigned as director of International Trade and Investment in February, The Sun newspaper reported. She also received a £40,000 performance-related bonus on top […]