Before ruminating on the “lies” and “propaganda” of the Brexit campaign, Jean-Claude Juncker heartily endorsed Rishi Sunak’s Northern Ireland deal. Speaking to Andrew Marr for LBC, he called the deal a “real breakthrough”, saying he was “quite happy” with what he described as “diplomacy at its best”. Jean-Claude then gave further insight into why he was so keen on the deal:
“I think that the European Commission will have more authority than it seems. And as the European Court of Justice has been reconfirmed in its role as arbiter, when it comes to internal market questions concerning Northern Ireland. So, I think that although the deal is giving response to the major British concerns, there is a part of European Union in the deal some in Britain is trying to hide.”
Rishi will not be grateful for this lavish endorsement. Boris might be onto something here…
The former EU Commission President had surprisingly complimentary things to say about the Prime Minister on HardTalk last night in a complete turnaround from his comments during the referendum. Or indeed his mocking Theresa May’s dancing…
Boris has finally presented his detailed proposals to abolish the Backstop in a letter to the EU. The ERG and DUP are behind the proposals, now over to Varadkar…
Read the proposals in full below…
Following Boris’s letter to the EU last night, the EU Commission has written to the Council in response to the points raised by the PM, refusing to budge on the Backstop and rejecting Boris’s accusation that it is not democratic. Shows what passes for ‘democracy’ in the eyes of the EU…
The letter claims the UK has offered “no realistic alternatives”, but says the Commission is “ready to work constructively within our mandate” and will “analyse any operational UK ideas that are compatible with the existing WA”. Read it in full here:
It’s not just Downing Street where regime change is taking place today, the EU is also in the process of replacing some of its unelected Eurocrats with other unelected Eurocrats. One who’s been a little bit too keen to act like an elected politician is Martin Selmayr, who’s got the chop after his attempts to manipulate the selection of the new EU Commission President backfired. After his scandalous appointment and ignominious downfall, Selmayr will presumably be out on his ear? Don’t be silly, this is the EU…
Instead Selmayr’s managed to waltz straight into another plum EU post as the EU’s Head of Representation in Vienna – it’s a clear demotion but he’ll have a nice €17,000-a-month salary with minimal tax to cushion the blow. He won’t even need to worry about what to do in the meantime, he’s been made temporarily reappointed as a special adviser to Juncker again until his poodle steps down in October. Classic EU rewards for failure, although failed UK appointees are hardly strangers to the revolving door either…
