Press

Chief economist at the Centre for European Reform Christian Odendahl wrote on Twitter, attaching a picture of a survey by Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung: "Approval rating of Merkel‘s government is in free fall, on the back of the vaccine disaster and mishandling of the second wave."

“When Britain was in the European nucleus, it could counterbalance the French and German view that Russia could be dealt exclusively by trade and diplomacy,” said Ian Bond, director of foreign policy at the Centre for European Reform and a former British diplomat. “When Britain left the EU, the center of gravity shifted to a softer line toward Russia.”

But Christian Odendahl, of the Centre for European Reform in Berlin, thinks Mr Braun has done Mr Laschet and Europe a favour, “to break the taboo, for after the election”. And the chancellor was probably behind it. “This was Merkel holding the pen.”

The rules of origin requirements are a little more useful, according to Sam Lowe at the Centre for European Reform.“The benefit of having an agreement with all of these countries instead of individual bilateral agreements is that you can use inputs from other members when trying to meet local contact thresholds, which makes it a bit easier to qualify for tariff-free trade,” he says.

Sam Lowe, senior research fellow at the Centre for European Reform, said accession could be a useful counterpoint to those who thought Brexit was a nationalist policy and a retreat from the world stage.“Even signalling that the UK wants to join the CPTPP is a useful global signal that the UK is still interested in rules based trade, is still interested in working together with others,” he said.

“People refer to lots of the problems as teething problems,” said Sam Lowe, senior fellow at the Centre for European Reform in London. “But while businesses will learn how to fill in forms, we should acknowledge that new bureaucracy is the new reality and there’s a lot more to come.”

Sam Lowe, of the Centre for European Reform, a think tank, points out that doing deals is also harder when there is no deadline.

Charles Grant, Director of the Centre for European Reform, fears the UK still has five key areas that will determine the future relationship between the country and the European Union. Mr Grant looked at European countries outside the EU, like Switzerland, who have been in a constant negotiation limbo with the bloc since the mid-seventies. The political expert forecast Brexit Britain may soon be entering a similar situation and face as much as 50 years of additional talks with Brussels.