News and Opinion

Jeremy Corbyn’s dismissal of Owen Smith is yet more evidence that Labour is just as bad as the Conservatives when it comes to Brexit. Both are pursuing a disastrous Brexit with catastrophic outcomes as the end scenario. This is further illustrative of the long-standing fact that the 48% do not have a place in either […]

Facebook might seen like a humbled giant, right now. But make no mistake, its business model is never going to change, says PARMY OLSON. And that means people will remain products. ‘I started Facebook, and at the end of the day I’m responsible for what happens on our platform.’ This was the most sincere remark […]

Join the team for another trawl through the murky waters of Brexit. Richard Porritt, Steve Anglesey and Geri Scott delve into the week’s Brexit news. Topics include the data breach scandal, more cash for NHS workers and a year to go until the UK quits the European Union. And, as always, another Brexiteer of the […]

Steve Anglesey names the worst Brexiteers of the week. ROGER HELMER ‘Delighted to note the appointment of John Bolton as President Trump’s new National Security Advisor. Sound man,’ tweeted the sleepy former UKIP MEP. Can any keen-eyed readers spot what mustachioed, bespectacled extremist Roger could possibly see in mustachioed, bespectacled extremist Bolton? DAVID DAVIS The […]

With exactly one year to go until the moment Britain leaves the EU, we asked our writers for five predicitions for the next 12 months. MICHAEL WHITE • Brexit will happen. Short of a major world crisis there will be no second referendum, at least not in the UK • Angela Merkel will fall before […]

The Brexit process is still characterised by significant political and economic uncertainty one year after the UK triggered Article 50, a new report by academic group The UK in a Changing Europe says. It finds that a lack of clear direction is affecting the ability to plan for the future in several policy sectors, including […]

It is a year since Article 50 was triggered. Which means, soberingly, this time next year Brexiteers will probably be about to celebrate their first ‘independence day’. How depressing. Of course Brexit could still be stopped. Any number of events might still get in the way of our exit, or at least shape the kind […]

As inflation news lifts some businesses ANGELA JAMESON warns of more troubles ahead With Easter upon us, there is some good news at last. The Federation of Small Business tells us that confidence among small UK firms is rebounding against a backdrop of lower inflation. Small firms are also encouraged by what they believe to […]

The data scandal embroiling social network perfectly illustrates the dangers of naïvety, arrogance and evangelism to which all the tech giants are vulnerable, says former industry insider GEOFF SUTTON Mark Zuckerberg is clearly a smart guy. He got over the decision-making challenge of what to wear by donning precisely the same style of grey T-shirt […]

You might, as a Remainer, be wondering if there is any hope, writes MATT KELLY. Don’t despair – there is William Goldman, the screenwriter whose credits include Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and All The President’s Men, was once asked what the secret to Hollywood was. ‘Nobody knows anything,’ he replied. ‘Not one person […]

Having promised farmers the earth, Brexiteers now have no meaningful plan for the agricultural sector, says Lib Dem MP TIM FARRON The vote to leave the EU has put farming and agricultural businesses in huge danger. Farmers are threatened with cuts to the support which underpins their livelihoods and ability to manage the countryside, as […]

UK businesses view European migrants as more motivated, flexible and willing to work longer hours than the domestic labour force, according to a report from government advisers. Employers do not think of themselves as hiring employees from the European Economic Area (EEA) because they are prepared to accept lower terms and conditions, but because they […]

Tony Blair’s latest Brexit intervention takes aim at the government and Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour – read it in full here Tony Blair delivers a speech in Parliament Photo: Contributed – Credit: Archant On one thing everyone is agreed: Brexit is the most important decision this country has taken since the end of World War 2 […]

The takeover tussle involving GKN and Melrose is a tale for our times, says ANGELA JAMESON You think football managers are entertaining when they start taking pot shots at each other? Try following a corporate takeover battle. Next week will see the culmination of an unexpected and precocious assault on one of Britain’s biggest and […]

Jacob Rees-Mogg has accused supporters of Britain remaining in the EU as “cave dwellers” in a speech to mark one year until Brexit. The Tory MP and Hard Brexiteer also claimed the EU would be “insolvent” if Britain left without a deal. Asked at his speech in central London how he would have responded if […]

How the Democrats are finding their way back from the wilderness explains BONNIE GREER There is an interesting phenomenon in the States now that is barely being mentioned. The Democratic Party is winning by-elections. With no leader. The recent effect of this phenomenon is the election of Conor James Lamb. Lamb is a former prosecutor, […]

The Sun yesterday acknowledged its story on lower prices after Brexit was false. But Jacob Rees-Mogg, who enthusiastically endorsed it, remains shtum It was, by any standards, a belter of a clarification. Appearing on page 2 of The Sun yesterday, it ran to 214 words – incredibly, longer than the original article it was correcting. […]

Tony Blair has launched a stinging attack on Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership over Brexit saying Labour top brass is committed to leaving the European Union. The former prime minister said the party’s leadership was happy to see Britain quit the EU ‘whether for reasons of opportunism or covert opposition’ to the bloc. In a speech in […]

A Downing Street aide is facing calls to resign after allegedly “outing” a whistleblower who claimed the official Brexit campaign broke strict spending rules during the EU referendum. Shahmir Sanni claimed at the weekend that Vote Leave used its links with another pro-Brexit group to get round the £7m spending limit monitored by the Electoral […]

PAUL CONNEW on the war of the words taking place in Capitol Hill and the chaotic world of Trump’s presidency ‘When the full extent of your venality, moral turpitude, and political corruption becomes known, you will take your rightful place as a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of history. You may scapegoat Andy McCabe, but […]

A poll which suggested more voters rate leaving the EU as a priority ahead of maintaining the Union with Northern Ireland did not ask a single person in Northern Ireland what they thought. More than a third of those polled (36%) for the radio station LBC said exiting the EU was a higher priority than […]

The 2003 conflict is blamed for setting the Middle East ablaze, but in one unintentional and surprising way it helped bring stability to another hotspot explains ELLIOT SHORT Back in March 2003, George W Bush’s ‘coalition of the willing’ launched an invasion of Iraq, the consequences of which reverberate to this day. The now-ubiquitous US […]

MICHAEL WHITE on the transitional deal and the problems that still remain over the Irish border Home late from the theatre, I broke half a lifetime’s habit and switched on BBC Newsnight to see how David Davis’s latest ‘decisive’ breakthrough in Brussels was being received at home. To judge by the pained expression on the […]

Thousands of anti-Brexit campaigners demonstrated across Britain this weekend calling on the government to halt the rush to quit the European Union. Exeter March. Picture: John Presley – Credit: Archant The protests kicked off on Friday in Oxford at Christopher Wren’s Sheldonian Theatre where Andrew Adonis and Will Hutton previewed their new book. Lib Dem […]

David Davis has claimed the Irish border issue will be ‘much easier’ to solve after the European Union trade deal is agreed. Speaking on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show, with his usual hubris, the Brexit secretary said such a deal is now ‘incredibly probable’ and added that the government would protect the Good Friday Agreement […]

The officially designated Brexit campaign ‘cheated’ during the European Union referendum, a whistleblower has claimed. The claims centre around Vote Leave’s links to another campaign – BeLeave – which it helped fund. Shahmir Sanni, who worked on the campaign, claimed Vote Leave used it to get around strict spending limits set by the Electoral Commission. […]

We should recognise that however charmingly it is sold, what Rees-Mogg is selling is toxic, and not fit for consumption, says JAMES BALL During his early years in parliament, Jacob Rees-Mogg was a joke. Despite being the multi-millionaire part-owner and manager of a hedge fund, with hard-right homophobic and anti-choice views, his faux aristocracy was […]

Following the death of Anna Campbell -the first British woman to die fighting alongside Kurdish forces in Syria- YASMIN ALIBHAI BROWN asks how we should treat the ‘jihadis’ who return home. How very sad that Anna Campbell, a young British woman, has been killed in Afrin, northern Syria. She went off to join the Kurdish […]

Understanding Vladimir Putin’s foreign policy is not difficult, says JENNIFER MATHERS. But countering it could be The poisoning of former Russian intelligence officer Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia is seen as just the latest in a long line of audacious foreign policy moves authorised by Moscow since Vladimir Putin returned to the presidency in […]

As relations with Russia become ever chillier, PAUL KNOTT unearths a document from the 1940s with advice on dealing with Moscow which seems remarkably relevant today. Vladimir Putin might seem intent on returning us to the Cold War, but fortunately for Western leaders a blueprint already exists for dealing with this situation. Written in 1946, […]

A first class sentimental journey says TIM WALKER Old black and white films had their own subtle ways of conveying messages that were deemed to be awkward at the time they were made. The sight of a character seated with a blanket over his or her legs tended, for instance, to be a portent of […]

Michael Romberg doesn’t believe Jeremy Corbyn will ever change his mind on Brexit – here he explains why. Those who hope that Jeremy Corbyn will change his line (Zoe Williams, The New European, issue 87) should imagine what his conversion-to-Remain speech would have to say. The first line is easy: ‘The deal that Theresa May […]