taking yourself with what's like twenty years you've been analyzing and reporting from from this capital that you were think when when you started off as a european correspondent for the eighty of newspapers the that is to get the position where you were commenting on this all process of the u.k. withdrawing from the european union altogether well i came from a background of working on mostly regional papers in the u.k. it's interesting how the sort of the distinction between the way the e.u. is reported maybe a to regional level and local pressure in the u.k. and national level where there's a really huge difference the regionals in the u.k. they take him i think data on published will do a generally sympathetic approach concentrate on what the unit was doing for their region as opposed to the way the geopolitics is exactly that's that's a great way of describing i think so i came from that regional newspaper background

i had a certain uncertainty about the e.u. the biggest one was a circle of ignorance really mom my own me my own part about how the e.u. works what it's about what it does those and the sort of communications machinery now has which is absolutely massive i do think that was fairly common of how the european union was supported of in europe thinks of the constant references to the brussels bureaucracy and fight the brussels bureaucracy numerically what it was less than the scottish government's bureaucracy and how the numbers that's one example could be lots of others the i used to work in in birmingham for twelve years where the bureaucracy apparently uses almost as the same size of the one here in brussels with the commission the parliament of the council combined the number of civil servants of function as is called here of course are pretty similar between the two birmingham members souls and one side started working here i realised just how. important the e.u.

is the institutions are the numbers of people that are employed in the related bodies. that was nearly twenty years ago it's increased many times since so i gives you an idea of sort of just how important the e.u. is the as an entity as a source of employment in this city alone back in birmingham for instance a population not dissimilar to brussels by the way about a million there are good comparisons to be made as somebody who has. used the phrase gone native in brussels being a. correspondent for so many publications over the years how do you gauge the the reaction to what's happening with this untamable black suppose as we have of other nationalities in this the capital city of europe of the last kind is it like some intolerably long it's never coming to a conclusion i mean we have our people with that i think should but it's a great question and i ask this question from time to time over this what has been

a very an incredibly protracted period now no one could have imagined just how torturous the whole thing would be to take the view that even from my early days here the mentality that the u.k. was always slightly i call it semi detached member of the e.u. never really quite fully engaged fully as fully enthusiastic as as it might have been or simply compared with several of the member states that's had lots of opt outs its out sort of exemptions from this that and the other so i think that the u.k. generally. whether you break that down into the english discourse the irish i think has been seen as a certain degree of curiosity its role in the e.u. its role in europe is that as well as we may call it is that an exasperated truce phrase of a couple of weeks back in a special place in hell for for the black city. who engaged in this was really

a scintilla of an idea it was going to reflect that total exasperates in from top to bottom about the u.k.'s attitude with what people think of the other thinking though this little girl isn't just let's get this over with i think the the actual approach to the u.k. and the what may have been a certain degree of understanding sympathy even for some of the issues that were raised voted upon by the brits back in twenty sixteen cindy is certain empathy with that may be a thing that's gradually changed now in israel that's eroded and there is a certain a large chunk knowledge degree of frustration and annoyance and bordering on anger which made her partly presumably explain the slightly in characteristic al person mr tosk who is generally seen here in brussels as very supportive of great britain to me gives an indication of his just virtually given up on the fact that he thinks as he clearly did there may be

a reversal of its decision to stay and it's gone now and this this is a survey of a slightly encouraged christic outburst outpouring of how he feels you know the point makes very interesting observer of the scene like yourself a comment here in brussels would have regarded donald tusk as someone sympathetic to the u.k. at least at the outset these negotiations perhaps even someone who harbored the the hope that accommodation could be found over the medium term at least with all of the back to the european firmament but now seems totally exasperated was both to see if that's what the supporters are feeling while the opponents think well the thing there's a large element of truth in that i think that the political class in the us to toss young others bernie and many many others there's a certain degree of fear here of what comes next now post brings it in the next two or three years if not in a shorter period so marking banks if you had to. over your twenty years experience

do you think the endgame of blacks is going to be more cohesion in the report remains while the other twenty seven countries it should be said of the of the european union or do you think there's going to be eventually some sort of domino effect where for breaks starts to unglue the the sticking together of the of the european press is a big question i think what's going to happen i think there's a lot of fear if the u.k. seem to make success of bragg's it which we will happen then that is not good news for the e.u. and that will spell problems for the e.u. if great britain seem to be making a mess of post preg sick life as it is power to the of the negotiations i'm a doubt so i think it will do well but we'll see but if it seem to do if it's into make a mess then that will make that will spell good news for the e.u. and brussels that will pull it all together say look they can then say look what a mess the u.k. is made of this. don't to do the same thing stay with us there's safety in numbers

in a globalized world that's the place to be but isn't that why michel barnier as bad as this first line of negotiations was to ensure that whatever deal the u.k. was offered a deal which remember the prime minister except it would be less good than the deal available to a loyal member state of the european union you know i think that the put the people at barney and the current council president the youngster in a incredibly difficult position of the young just just at the press conference just recently after the comments by tusk the hellish comment he said you said that this job is hell i think you meant specifically this job apprentice it's in and trying to negotiate the sort of the exit of big member player is hell so i should we use referring to the current incredibly protracted negotiations about the you.

case exists as i said a secret wish you might have that the next thing you become a thing on is the possible re n.c. negotiations i therefore the and or perhaps even the masons were friendly and i think well we keep hearing about the votes in referenda referenda are a once in a lifetime on once in a lifetime never happen again and there are lots of people here in brussels who hope maybe even believe that the u.k.'s decision to exits will be reversed and there will be a repeat of all this can we take the repetition of all this can we take even another referendum because that would mean rehearsing and going over the whole story once again great copy for journalists like me keeps a lot of journalists in very busy indeed whether it keeps them mentally fit that's another question well it's whatever happens you'll be here to write the bird so that i thank you for thinking about exam and sure if they talk to the queen. north a thing will be of course enough to go into the with us as the whiskey in the quick

and past loaned or your close friends here only scotch mind was very kind of i work with a scot my boss is a scot i know the scots take a slight loss in the same attitude to first give up the fight it's over thank you thanks a lot coming up after the break alex speaks to labour's london boy finger tip about thai brits as your guide to from a european perspective and rather than new independent get launched this week as a break way from labor has any chance of picking up support received. i've been saying the numbers mean something they've mastered us with over one trillion dollars in debt more than ten white collar crime stamping each day. eighty five percent of global wealth you long for the old rich eight point six percent

world market those thirty percent some with four hundred to five hundred three per second per second and this one rose to twenty thousand dollars. china's building two point one billion dollars a i industrial park but don't let the numbers over. the only number you need to remember one one business show you know for the mists of one and only boom box. after the previous stage of my career was over everyone wondered what i was going to do next the ball different clubs on one hand it is logical to say the home fields where everything is familiar on the other i wanted a new challenge and a fresh perspective i'm used to surprising us all why not seriously.

i'm going to talk about football not the or else in the sink i was going to go. by the way ways of that slide here. on. the list and in. my set up a set to my destination. in. college so there are a lot of build a little. tiny and in the human mind mission was. look. under the hood of the guard we. don't want the knob and i don't want to worry about. something that morning. on the street just.

thrown up on the. motivation. you know but a little off and you know. this and. you know world of big part of the law and conspiracy it's time to wake up to dig deeper to hit the stories that mainstream media refuses to tell more than ever we need to be smarter we need to stop slamming the door. and shouting past each other it's time for critical thinking it's time to fight for the middle for the truth the time is now we're watching closely watching the hawks. in the. city with what obama has done personally i think he has not done enough i think in

syria for example in two thousand and thirteen when there was a threat and we knew that the us invasion was about to use chemical weapons on a wide scale like he has done in. the obama administration should have responded with force and eliminate the capacity of the city to use helicopters and other if forced to trouble that it bombs on people says. welcome back as a european problem a tyranny of the year no one is in a better position than clark mary's to be there in the break i did a week of the. c.d.f. parliamentary defections from labor for forty years couldn't care less whether breck that will break labor. you grew up at double d. so you're well aware of what a blue arc is one more might imagine says so tell me from your vantage point in brussels what do you make of britain's brett brewer well alex growing up in

scotland i grew up in done d'un then in starling and i think the scots have got the best words for the the mess that we're in frankly and but it's also it's quest's a real situation here i'm the last british very proud by the way have my my scottish upbringing for the last one to be here chairing a committee and that is because you know you know the parliament in you know the european institutions very well and that's quite a funny position to be in because we're still legislating i just came out of a legislative trialed they call it and wish still doing that i'm still doing that and we're just a few weeks away from a big country britain leaving the european union so it's a really surreal situation and there's a lot of a mix of kind of anger confusion and be amusement frankly. you

know our government hasn't got its act together and they're risking no deal i think that's the that's the nub of it that they're risking a no deal as part of their sort of calamitous kind of negotiating strategy plugin regard to those one of britain's most influential members of the european parliament as well as one of the longest serving how do other of europeans regard what's happening to britain do the understand atolls or any explanation mean you can offer who should lighten them i mean alex before i came on to your program are saying two year producers that i growing up in scotland i watched years a politician growing up and a lot of respect for you. so i want to be very honest and say to you that what has happened in recent days and weeks is that there's a growing i think a growing frustration with britain i think for a long time there was a lot of patience and a lot of goodwill but i want to be honest with you and say that what i'm detecting

in the last days maybe the last few weeks is a growing irritation and i want to be honest about it that people are starting to get very tired of this process the you see it in the legislation you see it in quiet ways but honestly i think people are getting tired they're getting tired of the process that again tired of the way the negotiations were conducted and they're getting tired of this sort of game of chicken at the end so you know i think there's been a lot of goodwill shown to members who. wanted to do well here i think some of the labor members the the s.n.p. members and others who actually did the work here the ones who didn't do the work frankly well you know who they where you kip and others frankly there wasn't that much goodwill but overall you know there was a kid up this fear but no what i'm detecting is

a growing tiredness and that is very sad to see maybe it was inevitable alex you know but it is really the kind of end of days feeling and what is sad about it is that we still haven't got a kind of idea of what kind of breaks it would be so it's a fairy horrible kind of feeling actually and brussels were led by donkeys campaign of of take it out one of their famous postals reminding the prime minister of course she used to say that it was a britain strategic and first to be part of the european union do you think interviews of me will notice that post of yours she did go. over the last couple of days i really allow. these guys led by donkeys the freeze actually is such a resident freezer you know that very well alex and it's a great freeze in politics lions led by donkeys you know we need that frees growing up and it's a very resonant one on the progressive side of politics so of course. you know

these guys have done a great job i follow them on twitter by the way and they're very effective these say billboards you know because the just remind people of the hypocrisy you know people saying on the one hand you stay in the european union the next minute you just see what the hell you like about it and it is extraordinary to see some of the things that these politicians have said all the way up to teresa me so yeah i mean i think people in brussels will still be quite gobsmacked to see this stuff although i guess the know it but yeah these guys have done a great job with a larger and some paste and some billboards good luck to them follow them on twitter and long may the keep doing it my mission barmy the european union's key negotiator still seems genuinely confused as to what it is that the british government actually wants or you're in a position to enlighten them i spoke to. every show barney last week in fact on my

twitter feed people will see me sitting with him talking to him and i told him really about citizens' rights what's going to happen to the three million who are in britain of course you know in scotland many in scotland all over britain and above course the brits all over the year peon union as well but i was talking to him about what is happening in the negotiation he's in a very tough position because he felt he had completed the negotiation now he feels that you know i'm not giving away any secrets by saying that his position is that he feels how can he open the withdrawal agreement he just doesn't feel that that is possible so i guess what he's being asked. and again i'm not revealing any great secrets here but what he's being asked is to tinker around with this political declaration and what she's amazing to be seeing is trying to get something in the political declaration to assuage the tory party this is always about making the

tory party feel better rather than looking to the wider country or to where other m.p.'s are with other progressives are and see what they want so this is what he's being asked to do and it's a tough position for him is he in gauging yes he is so of course this negotiations are happening i've got to be you know clear about that they are happening. whether they're going to be able to get it done and whether the m.p.'s on the hard right of the tory party will accept the tweaks to the political declaration on the irish backstop i just don't know and of course nobody wants to be throwing ireland on that bus and i would be pretty angry if that ever happens but lord over the last few days we've seen a defect shouldn't strong labor party to the independent group at westminster yes they'll be three defections from the tories will no realignments at westminster

have any impact on the politics of brussels i think of course people in brussels are talking about it let's be honest not just in westminster they're talking of a to here as well where people are avidly interested in politics globally and and also in britain and they're talking about what it means for realignment and i think the consensus here is that while it may not have an impact on the actual raw numbers for break said i think there is that consensus there's a feeling that it might have a slow burn effects alex you know it might have an effect that we quite can't put our finger on at the moment and i think that's what the feeling is here and people know it's profound in some way but the they don't. it might have an immediate effect on the numbers trees or me thinking of coming back next week on the deal because of course many of these m.p.'s who have formed a new group we know where they stood on breaks it already but of course it's creating a more free breillat misfit in westminster as you well know i mean you you know

this better than anyone so for that reason things are getting more skittish in the in the year in the in the we're in westminster and people in brussels know that so does that make it more likely that we get a deal or less likely but i think m.p.'s are more afraid that's the impression people get here will that lead them to a deal you never know with the tory hard right again that's what people feel here called belief one final question you represent very ably in london in the european parliament but you grew up in scotland both for strong remain voting areas do you have any thoughts on what the long term political implications might be for scotland if it's dragged out of the european union against the will of the people but i love scotland london a place that would accept somebody like me that grew up in scotland is of indian origin and the accepted me to represent them and that's what i love about both areas both three main areas scotland in london and i like that identity and i think

both will suffer very badly breaks it scotland will suffer because scotland was an open country looking outwards towards free movement so the benefit of it and you know alex people might not know about the old alliance but you know i knew what the old alliances i did scots law university and i rose i always want that for the whole of britain london will suffer badly for very obvious reasons not just free movement but for that of the economic reasons so you know this is going to be the slow burn effect of bracks it i feel very sad about it and i'm never going to change my opinion about that but for scotland in london two of the regions the. well really feel it but they knew that before breaks it and the scotland in london did the right thing let's hope that that fair ever stays and let's see how the people of scotland in london deal with this situation and what they do you have to words plot but there is thank you so much with appearing on now examine show and

reminding us of the older lives it's a real pleasure alex thank you very much. this week's big news at westminster has been the formation of the independent group of m.p.'s starting on monday was southern defections from the labor party they were joined by name from choose the yes the three tories defected the three amigos to join the gang of independents this means that the new parliament to grouping is already much the liberal democrats in terms of numbers in the house of commons is this a long heralded realignment of british politics as with or takes a look at the history and one nine hundred eighty one there was a gang of four and a line stick aeration almost forty years later there is the secret seven he formed an independent grouping of m.p.'s now with no disrespect to the new grouping they don't quite have the cachet of the former cabinet ministers who form the s.t.p. not as yet do they have the coherence of a political program necessary to launch

a new political party nor are they the first people to have this idea recently and the last two years alone they've been half a dozen new parties floated and then sunk the radical party was launched in twenty sixteen and now has four hundred twenty followers on twitter a year later probably about a stick you're more home to see was threatening to stand against a reason main maidenhead as a launch gambit for spring the party later that year the democrats were launched and then floundered by late twenty seventeen the radicals were the chosen title of jenny clift of the economist but event resigned from his own party. at the same time two more parties renew and advance were competing for the created center and they then marched on a still operating albeit at a low level celebrities were said to be lining up to back a new party just last year while start again with one of the working titles for the breakaway united for change with

a favorite alternative for multi-millionaire simon franks in the last few months the u.k.'s existing center party the liberal democrats launched a campaign under the chilly inspiring title momentum for moderates these ministers and indeed the liberal democrats have all been overshadowed by the new independent group who seem to have little time for their established competitors from the political center all of these putative parties seem to instruct a moral tale even in the social media age treating about a new political force is so much easier than creating one however if ever there was a moment for political both in a sense this might be the one the political establishment at westminster is fracturing as never before whether you are to break the mold of british politics or just wanting to secure as you want the exit or one thing like the new back to party to stop or deal with huge up or indeed are going for scottish independence within

europe that we few more propitious opportunities the night this could be a time when fortune does indeed favor the brief. and so for alex and me and all the show good bye for now i i will see you next week. from the busted new stores pulled by it's no good to the salon you force knew the book told us to do so he's. going to want. to see the

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