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The prime minister of the Netherlands, Mark Rutte (of the supposedly classically liberal VVD party), says in an interview with Dutch website Nu.nl that he realizes that signing the EU treaty with Ukraine could cost him votes. Still, he implies, he intends on doing so. The hypocritical prime minister who, for months, pretended he'd take the referendum results seriously (more than 60 percent of the Dutch voted against the treaty in a referendum earlier this year), has no actual intent of doing so. Yes, he says, he realizes that it may cost him some votes, but hey, he's the Prime...

EU leaders expressed concern on Friday about the rise of populism within the bloc, fueled by the migrant crisis, as Italy came a step closer to forming its first anti-establishment government. “Being a good Italian also means being a good European citizen. It needs to be repeated out loud, especially now,” EU parliament head Antonio Tajani said at the State of the Union conference in the Tuscan city of Florence. Italy’s populist Five Star Movement and far-right League party are currently locked in negotiations to form a coalition to lead the country. Should they succeed, the new government would represent...

European nations like Hungary and Poland are reasserting their Christian culture, posing a bigger threat to Brussels than Brexit ever will. 2018 is already shaping up to be a difficult year for the European Union. While Brexit machinations dominate the headlines, the biggest threat to the EU comes at a far more fundamental level. In several of the union’s eastern member states, conservative and populist governments are reasserting their national sovereignty. They perceive the EU’s federalist desire for centralized control and common policies across the bloc as threatening their identities. This friction, combined with a reassertion of Christian identity in...

Her eurosceptic rhetoric sounds a lot like that of former Ukip leader Nigel Farage, even telling of her admiration for the 53-year-old’s Brexit campaign as she told supporters to “take their country back”. She said: “I look at Nigel Farage’s example. It took 17 years, but Brexit came. “I don’t plan to wait that long.” She claims the EU has turned “Finland into its province” and has railed against the country’s political elite, who she argues do not represent the working class.

Globalist French President Emmanuel Macron told citizens in European Union (EU) countries to resist “nationalists and skeptics” and support him as he pushes for greater integration of the bloc. Breaking from tradition by addressing “fellow citizens” in the EU rather than solely the citizens of the country he was elected to govern, President Macron told television viewers on Sunday evening: “2018 is a very special year, and I will need you this year.” “I need for us, together, not to give way on anything, neither to nationalists nor to the skeptics,” he said, in a thinly veiled attack on Central...

Finland will leave the European Union and position itself as the Switzerland of the north to protect its independence if Laura Huhtasaari, the presidential candidate of the eurosceptic Finns Party has her way. Finns Party deputy chairman and presidential candidate Laura Huhtasaari poses for a picture at the Finland's Parliament in Helsinki, Finland December 13, 2017. REUTERS/Tuomas Forsell She also told Reuters in an interview she wants to tighten immigration rules. Huhtasaari -- dubbed “Finland’s Marine Le Pen” after France’s National Front leader -- is a long-shot. But she believes she has a real chance in the January election as...

More than 260,000 people in Austria have signed a petition urging the Austrian government to leave the European Union (EU). According to reports on Thursday, as many as 261,159 Austrians signed the petition. The number in total represents 4.12 percent of the country's electorate. Since under the country's regulations the threshold for calling a debate on a potential referendum is 100,000 people, the Austrian parliament must discuss a referendum on leaving the EU. The call for leaving the EU was most popular in the regions of Lower Austria and in Carinthia where 5.18 percent and 4.85 percent of potential voters,...

More than 1 million foreigners living in Britain will be banned from voting in the EU referendum, the Conservatives have announced, in a significant boost to Eurosceptic campaigners. David Cameron believes that the British people must decide the future of the nation's membership of the European Union in the first referendum for more than 40 years. The EU referendum bill, which will be announced this week after the Queen's Speech, will make clear that only British, Irish and Commonwealth citizens who are resident in the UK will be allowed to vote. It comes after Eurosceptic MPs confronted ministers over the...

A Euro-skeptic bloc within the European Parliament has collapsed. A Latvian member has pulled out of the group, breaching an EU rule that at least seven countries must be represented in a parliamentary faction. […] The exit also prompted European Parliament President Martin Schulz to postpone the assembly’s decision over this year’s Sacharov human rights prize until Tuesday next week. Nominees include Ukraine’s pro-EU Maidan protesters. […] There was a celebratory response from the main center-right European People’s Party (EPP) faction in the parliament, which alternates its sittings between Brussels and Strasbourg. “First defeat for euro-skeptics!” the EPP responded in...

Rather than choosing a former Ukip leader as their candidate in South Thanet, the party should have selected a liberal figure capable of winning tactical votes. With a whimper, rather than a bang, Nigel Farage has confirmed that he is standing for selection as Ukip's candidate in South Thanet. Farage finished fourth when he stood in the Tory-held seat in 2005, and only managed third place when he ran in John Bercow's Buckingham constituency in 2010, but he is right to believe he can improve on both of these performances. A recent Lord Ashcroft poll put Ukip in first place...

LONDON – Setting up an intriguing election battle, Britain’s opposition Labor Party announced Friday that it had hired President Obama’s chief campaign advisor to help the party return to power next year over the ruling Conservatives. The decision to recruit David Axelrod means that the 2015 British election will pit two of Obama’s strategists against each other. Working for the Conservatives is Jim Messina, who, like Axelrod, toiled on both of Obama’s presidential campaigns and who served as his deputy White House chief of staff during his first term. “David is used to tough fights, and he is going to...

Britain's Labour Party leader Ed Miliband has conscripted the services of American campaigns professional David Axelrod, otherwise known as the architect behind President Barack Obama's U.S. election victory in 2008. The appointment of Axelrod to the Labour team is the latest in a long line of foreign consultants brought in to try and help Ed Miliband's team on the run up to the UK General Election in May 2015. Axelrod follows in the footsteps of 69-year-old U.S. community organiser Arnie Graf, who embarrassed Labour by claiming he was working for them, rather than consulting for them, without a UK work...

European lawmakers on Thursday eased the way for cartel victims to claim compensation from companies under new rules that also shield price-fixing whistleblowers from being the main target of million-euro lawsuits. The green light from the European Parliament came nine years after the European Commission broached the idea, seeing it as an additional tool, on top of fines, to deter companies from breaking antitrust laws. According to the Commission, only one in four cartels and antitrust infringements faced damages claims in the last seven years. Its 2010 estimate put the cost of unrecovered damages of infringements at over €20 billion...

(Reuters) - Britain's economy could grow by 1.3 billion pounds if it left the European Union due to less regulation and more trade with emerging economies, a British diplomat who dreamt up a prize-winning blueprint for the country's EU exit said on Tuesday. Britain's free market Institute of Economic Affairs on Tuesday awarded a 100,000-euro prize to Iain Mansfield, a British diplomat based in the Philippines, who it decided had come up with the best blueprint for a 'Brexit,' a British departure from the EU. Amid widespread public disenchantment in Britain about the EU's perceived over-bearing role in everyday life...

The Tory revolt over Europe took a dramatic turn last night after senior Conservative David Davis called on the Government to open talks with Brussels on quitting the EU. Former Tory chairman Mr. Davis tore into David Cameron, accusing him of making a mess of his pledge to win back powers from the EU. “Scaremongers” who said Britain would collapse if it decided to go it alone were talking nonsense, said Mr Davis. Quitting the EU would be like a “revolution” and would boost UK jobs, wages, world power, arts and prestige, he added. Significantly, his intervention comes days after...

(Reuters) - Prime Minister David Cameron's handling of an expenses scandal engulfing one of his ministers has put him under pressure before European elections, threatening his Conservative party's already clouded electoral outlook. Cameron, whose party risks being beaten into third place in next month's European Parliament elections behind the anti-EU UK Independence party (UKIP), has stood by Maria Miller, Britain's minister for culture, since a parliamentary report ordered her to pay back wrongly claimed expenses last week. But the media and public backlash against Miller shows no sign of abating despite Cameron's efforts to end it. Many of his own...

The fragile Tory truce over Europe disintegrated last night after it emerged that more than 100 Conservative MPs and candidates are set to defy David Cameron at the General Election next year by vowing to leave the EU. The Prime Minister has promised the Tory manifesto will spell out his pledge for a referendum by 2017 on Britain’s links with Europe after trying to win back key powers from Brussels. But Tory rebels will go further and make their own personal manifesto vows to campaign to withdraw from the EU—regardless of any concessions by Brussels. …

The latest Opinium/Observer poll published on Sunday (19 January) suggested 52% of the British public aged over 18 would vote to leave the EU tomorrow, a small increase since last November when 50% said they would vote to leave. Sunday’s poll, carried out by Comres for the Independent on Sunday newspaper, also suggests the anti-EU and anti-immigration policies of the UK Independence Party (UKIP) remain popular, even though Cameron has already deployed tougher rhetoric on both issues. […] The poll came as UKIP was battling to restore party discipline after one of its local councillors in England caused it embarrassment...

The UK Independence Party will receive a multi-million pound boost before next year’s European elections after winning support from one of Britain’s wealthiest businessmen. Paul Sykes, a self-made tycoon and veteran of the campaign to keep the pound 15 years ago, has promised to do “whatever it takes” to help Ukip top the polls in May. His move deals a big blow to the Conservatives as they fight to contain Nigel Farage’s party. Mr Sykes supported the Tories under Margaret Thatcher and Michael Howard, but has backed Ukip in the past, giving the party £1.5 million in 2004. His latest investment...

The often stale British political system is being rocked by its very own Tea Party. The UK Independence Party (UKIP), formed in 1993 opposing Britain’s entry into the European Union, failed to make an electoral dent for a long time. However UKIP has built up steam in recent years and is spearheading a seismic shift in the British political spectrum. In this year’s local elections – the British version of midterms -- UKIP took a stunning 23 percent of the vote, up from the 3.1 percent they won in the 2010 national election. Their leader, Nigel Farage, is buoyed by...