Britain: 2018: The Year British Politics Has to Wake Up - by Denis MacShane

The decision of 37% of the electorate to vote to leave Europe has cast a spell on UK democracy. What no one foresaw was the way Brexit would become the Ebola Virus of normal political activity. It has sucked all life out of British democracy.

Prime Minister Theresa May’s latest attempt — a cabinet reshuffle — merely rearranges the chairs on the deck of her Titanic.

May’s other Brexit-related gimmick – the announcement to turn the color of the UK passport away from the EU’s burgundy color into a nice shade of Tory blue in the future – is telling. It would be the same colors as Croatian and North Korean passports.

Better yet, finding £500 million to introduce and run her new Brexit passports shows how far Brexit has sunk. What once were the lofty proclamations of “Independence Day” by Brexit enthusiasts has now turned into a Twitter scorn storm about “Colour Me Blue.”

Read more: 2018: The Year British Politics Has to Wake Up - The Globalist

Britain Return To The Fold: 9 ways Britain could stay in the European Union

While undoing Brexit altogether looks almost as unlikely today as it did in the immediate aftermath of the referendum last year, those who think Britain might be better off staying in the European Union are becoming more vocal as the complexities and potential costs of Brexit become clearer.

Vince Cable — who was crowned leader of the Liberal Democrats unopposed Thursday — has never supported leaving the bloc and is “beginning to think Brexit may never happen.” Former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair last weekend suggested the U.K. could stay in a reformed European Union. Even the director of the Vote Leave campaign, Dominic Cummings, admitted on Twitter this week that there are “some possible branches of the future” in which “leaving will be an error.”

Donald Tusk, the former Polish prime minister and European Council president, put it more poetically last month. “You may say I am a dreamer. But I am not the only one,” he said, channelling John Lennon.

In Westminster, anti-Brexit dreamers are scarce but POLITICO spoke to some of those who believe Brexit could yet be halted. The political odds might be stacked against them, but then very few correctly predicted the referendum vote in the first place.

Here are nine scenarios in which Britain stays in the European Union:
1. Public opinion changes

Remainers have been heartened by a number of polls since the June 8 election which have suggested an uptick in support for staying in the European Union, including one by Survation that found 54 percent of Brits would now prefer to remain in the bloc.

However Joe Twyman, head of political and social research at YouGov, which has been monitoring public opinion since the referendum, said the shifts in views had been too small to point of a definitive change of heart. He said the country was still divided down the middle, much as it was in the referendum vote itself but added that “things could change massively.”

“It is almost certain that as things do actually start to occur then there could be a movement in one way or another. People could say ‘this is working out really well, yay us.’ And so support for Brexit rises significantly. The opposite could be true if things go wrong.”

The main political parties are all monitoring the situation through private polling, according to Twyman. The “smart ones” understand the fluid nature of [public opinion] and are aware that polls could change significantly.

Read more: 9 ways Britain could stay in the European Union – POLITICO

Britain: Deloitte agrees not to bid for Government contracts after leaked Brexit memo row - by Steven Swinford

One of the world's biggest consultancies has agreed not to bid for central Government contracts for six months following a furious row with Theresa May over a Brexit memo.

Last month a consultant working for Deloitte claimed in a two-page memo that civil servants were struggling to cope with more than 500 Brexit-related projects amid Cabinet splits.

The memo prompted a withering response from Downing Street, which dismissed the memo as "unsolicited" and accused Deloitte of "touting for business".

Deloitte last night issued a statement saying that it had put forward "a plan for working with central Government to put this matter behind us".

It said: "Deloitte regrets the publication of the two-page note, and has apologised for the unintended disruption it caused the Government. The note was intended for internal audiences and was not a Deloitte point of view."

Downing Street declined to comment on the arrangement with Deloitte.

At the time the memo was leaked, former work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith said the consultancy should be stripped of Government contracts, while other Eurosceptic Conservative MPs suggested the document had been released in an attempt by Remain campaigners to frustrate Brexit.

Note EU-Digest: The Deloitte Memo also shows that Britain's government is ill prepareed  to cope with BREXIT's article 50  

Read more: Deloitte agrees not to bid for Government contracts after leaked Brexit memo row 

Refugees: Britain calls emergency meeting on Calais migrants

British Prime Minister David Cameron is due to chair an emergency meeting on the situation in Calais, where thousands of people have tried to stowaway to the UK. Cameron has come under fire for calling them a "swarm."

The meeting of the UK government's COBRA emergency committee was due to be held Friday, following another night in which hundreds of people attempted to reach the Channel Tunnel which links the French port of Calais - and mainland Europe - with Britain.

Prime Minister David Cameron's office posted on its official Twitter channel that the meeting would be about how the government would "tackle" the problem.

Note EU-Digest: It's amazing to see with what incompetence this problem is handled by the EU, France and Britain.

Read more: Britain calls emergency meeting on Calais migrants | News | DW.COM | 31.07.2015

Britain: Nick Clegg’s speech on Europe: "Richer, stronger, safer, greener"

"I am a pro-European – that is no great revelation, I know. But sometimes you need to say it, clearly and unambiguously.

The isolationist forces in Britain are on the rise – UKIP on the doorstep; Conservative politicians at their conference; familiar headlines in some of our newspapers each placing Britain’s ills firmly at Brussels’ door: too much immigration, too much crime, too much red tape. And every time Europe is back in the spotlight, their hostility towards it – this negative reaction to all things continental – drowns out the other voices in this debate.

Pro-Europeans have to take some responsibility for that. The moderate and rational voices have been too quiet up until now. But we cannot afford that silence anymore. We are no longer asking if Britain will have a referendum on continued membership, we are asking when Britain will have a referendum on continued membership.

The parties differ on the timing. The Conservative party want one in 2017, regardless of what’s happening in Europe at that time: it’s a date chosen for internal party management as much as anything else. The Liberal Democrats believe it will be far better to have the referendum when a serious change to Europe’s rules, affecting the UK, next arises. But we all agree that it will happen at some point or another."

Click here for the complete speech: In Full: Nick Clegg’s speech on Europe: Richer, stronger, safer, greener

Britain: EU exit would be economic suicide, warns Nick Clegg

It would be "economic suicide" for Britain to leave the European Union, Nick Clegg has warned.

The deputy PM said a new "coalition in the national interest" was needed to make the case for membership, and asked businesses and charities to help.

He attacked David Cameron's proposed referendum, calling it a "short-sighted political calculation" which could see the UK "stumble out" of the EU.

Eurosceptic group Business for Britain accused Mr Clegg of "scaremongering".

In a speech at the London headquarters of Swiss technology firm Buhler Group, Mr Clegg said EU withdrawal would leave Britain "isolated and irrelevant in our own backyard" and not "taken seriously" by world superpowers.

Note EU-Digest: Nick  Clegg is right. British Nationalist Right Wing Eurosceptics don't seem to have a sense of reality, are acting irresponsible, and will drag Britain down the drain.

Read more: BBC News - EU exit would be economic suicide, warns Nick Clegg