Brexit 

Express
A BREXITEER has lashed out at Germany after companies in Angela Merkel’s state have been forced to seek other markets as a result of red tape following Britain’s departure from the EU.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson signed a trade deal with the EU back in December and was based on zero tariffs on most goods. However, trade between the two has been disrupted by higher shipping costs, transportation delays, as well as stricter customs requirements, are the border.
The disruption caused by Brexit has forced German exporters to seek other markets or relocate production.
Germany accounts for more than a quarter of all EU exports to the UK and has been hit the hardest than other member states.
However, Alan Sked, emeritus professor of international history at LSE, has lashed out at Germany for “giving up” on Britain due to the red tape imposed following Brexit.
He tweeted: “German exporters are giving up on the UK market due to delays and red tape since Brexit.
“Well done Barnier!”
His comments come after German company Heller, a specialist in making crankshaft machines to mill engine parts, claimed it now takes “twice the time” to deliver goods to its factory in Redditch.
Klaus Winkler, chief executive of the company, said: “There is no vaccination against Brexit.
“A lorry travelling from Nürtingen to Redditch takes twice the time and we have to put a lot more hours into all the bureaucracy. 

Northern Ireland 

Sun
BRITAIN and the EU have six weeks to fix the Northern Ireland border chaos or risk the province plunging into warfare.
Chief Brexit minister David Frost has warned colleagues that July’s sectarian marching season is key to finding a solution.
Northern Ireland stayed in the Single Market after  Brexit to avoid the need for a hard border with the South.
But the EU’s insistence on the toughest customs checks is hammering businesses on both sides of the Irish Sea.
A source said: “The EU approach is having a huge impact on lives and, worse still, there are signs it is upsetting the delicate peace process.”
Lord Frost has told his EU counterpart Maros Sefcovic that the bloc has a responsibility to show flexibility and care. 

Immigration 

Express
NIGEL FARAGE has predicted that 20,000 migrants will cross the English Channel in 2021, a huge jump from last year’s figures.
His comments come after nine boats carrying almost 200 migrants made the journey in one day this week. The Home Office said that a further 53 people were prevented from making the journey by French authorities on Thursday.
So far, more than 2,500 people in small boats have reached the UK in 2021 so far which is an increase of more than 1,000 compared to the same period last year.
In a video published on his YouTube channel, the former Brexit Party leader predicted that the figures will continue to grow rapidly.
Mr Farage said: “Let me tell you that, to date, the number that have come illegally across the English, at least the number we know of, is now approaching 3,000.
“I said this time last year that 5,000 people might come throughout 2020. I was wrong. Completely wrong. 

Guardian
Britain’s hostile regime for potential EU migrants is traumatising visitors caught in its web and provoking further worries for European families receiving visits from relatives, according to accounts provided to the Guardian.
The slightest suspicion that someone may be entering Britain to work is often enough for them to be locked up, held at detention centres for up to a week and then expelled to wherever they have travelled from, some of those caught up by the policy have said. Complaints from relatives and host families in the UK have either gone unanswered or been ignored by the Home Office and some local MPs, they say.
An Italian NHS consultant told of his horror when his niece arrived from Italy for a short visit but ended up in a detention centre surrounded by barbed wire.
There is growing anger over what campaigners and MEPs have said is a “disproportionate” and “heavy-handed” implementation of post-Brexit immigration restrictions on EU citizens.
On Friday the EU’s co-chair of the post Brexit UK-EU partnership council, Maroš Šefčovič, told a group of Romanian MEPs he would be raising it with the UK authorities.
Giuseppe Pichierri, who has worked for the NHS for 15 years, told the Guardian he had waited for hours at Heathrow airport on 17 April with his four-year-old daughter to collect his 24-year-old niece Marta Lomartire with balloons and cards. 

Trade 

Express
MINISTERS are working towards a new post-Brexit deal with Canada that could “supercharge” Britain’s £17bn relationship with its Commonwealth ally.
The news was announced by International Trade Minister Ranil  Rayawardena on Twitter. He wrote: “Great to speak to business leaders from across Canada on the opportunities a new trade deal with Britain will bring for businesses on both sides of the Atlantic!
“Together we can supercharge our trade and investment relationship worth £17bn+.”
In more positive Brexit news Scottish salmon farmers exported more fresh fish to the EU than ever before in the first quarter of 2021.
This was despite critics claiming Brexit would weaken the European market for British fishermen.
According to the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation (SSPO) 19,410 tonnes of Scottish salmon were exported to the EU in the first three months of 2021, a 74 percent increase on last year.
Separately Boris Johnson warned the European Union against “issuing threats” to the UK amid an ongoing row over fishing rights could put a lucrative and vital deal on financial services in danger.
France has ramped up Brexit tensions by warning it will block an EU financial services deal with the UK unless the Prime Minister grants the bloc more access to British waters.
Emmanuel Macron’s government has lashed out at Britain and accused it of deliberately failing to issue licences to French fisheries.
But Downing Street has furiously hit back at the threats, as post-Brexit tensions between the sides again edge nearer to exploding. 

EU 

Express
LIFE-SAVING cancer medication is to be denied to patients living in parts of the UK as a result of post-Brexit red tape imposed by Brussels in a worrying sign of things to come.
Britain’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) last week approved osimertinib (brand name Tagrisso) for patients with early-stage lung cancer, in line with a worldwide scheme aimed at fast-tracking promising medicines. The treatment can improve survival rates by as much as 75 percent – but because it has not yet been given the green light by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) patients living in Northern Ireland are not eligible for it, as things stand.
The issue, which relates to the terms of the Northern Ireland protocol whereby the region remains bound to some EU rules and regulations, was described to the Times by one Government insider as being of “significant concern” because it has the potential to inflame already heightened tensions within the unionist community. 

Indian variant 

Mail
Boris Johnson will send the Army into Britain’s worst hotspots of the Indian coronavirus variant to assist with surge testing as he presses ahead with reopening – despite dire warnings from SAGE that the strain is more infectious and risks a serious third wave. 
The PM announced last night that Britain will press ahead with plans for indoor drinking and dining from next week, even while warning that there was ‘a real risk’ that the Indian variant could curtail further reopening in June.
Government scientists revealed in minutes released on Friday night that the variant could ‘realistically’ be 50% more infectious than the Kent strain, which models project could lead to 1,000 deaths a day, as well as 10,000 daily hospitalisations, by the summer.
Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty said that it is ‘highly likely that the strain is more transmissible. 
The Prime Minister added: ‘I do not believe that we need, on the present evidence, to delay our road map and we will proceed with our plan to move to step three in England from Monday.
‘But I have to level with you that this new variant could pose a serious disruption to our progress and could make it more difficult to move to step four in June.’ 
The experts’ concerns have now seen the Prime Minister pin his hopes of beating the virus on a ‘flexed’ jab drive, amid hopes that the success of the roll-out so far will keep Covid hospital admissions down even if the variant does prove to spread faster. 
Second doses of vaccines will be accelerated for the over-50s and the clinically vulnerable across the country, so they are given eight weeks after the first dose instead of the current 12 weeks.
All the evidence suggests that the vaccines effectively stop the development of symptoms caused by the Indian variant, but SAGE said there was some evidence that they could be less effective at halting transmission.   

Sun
BORIS Johnson tonight put a dent in hopes of a June 21 Independence Day after admitting the Indian variant could derail his roadmap.
The PM was forced to admit his plans could crumble within weeks as where he braced people in England for a longer lockdown.
Pals will still be able to meet in homes and pubs from Monday when the next state of lockdown easing goes ahead as planned from May 17.
But the scheduled end of all legal restrictions on June 21 could be kicked down the road if the super-infectious strain continues to spread, he warned.
Sounding a note of caution, the PM said: “I do not believe that we need, on the present evidence, to delay our roadmap and we will proceed with our plan to move to step three in England from Monday.
“But I have to level with you that this new variant could pose a serious disruption to our progress and could make it more difficult to move to step four in June.”
Spikes in cases of the highly-infectious Indian variant are causing a headache for ministers.
When asked if the 21 June unlocking would go ahead as planned, he replied: “I think the truth is that we, at this stage, simply can’t say for certain, as things stand…
“We rule nothing out. 

Breitbart
Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said that while rising cases of the Indian variant of the Chinese coronavirus will not affect phase three of unlocking the country on Monday, if the strain is found to pose a “serious disruption to our progress”, it could be “more difficult” to fully lift restrictions next month.
In recent days, the prime minister has expressed his concern over the spread of the new strain in the north-west of England, affecting areas such as Bolton and Blackburn, raising questions of whether such an outbreak could force a delay of fully ending restrictions. Four people have died from the Indian strain as of May 12th, according to Public Health England (PHE).
Speaking during a press conference from Downing Street on Friday, Mr Johnson signalled that the roadmap might change depending on how infectious the new strain is, saying: “We believe this variant is more transmissible than the previous one… but we don’t know by how much. I’m told that if it’s only marginally more transmissible, we can continue as planned. But if the variant is significantly more transmissible, we’re likely to face some hard choices.”
Seeking to reassure Britons that stage three of ending lockdown would still go ahead on the 17th of May, however, Johnson continued: “At this stage, there is no evidence of increased cases translating into unmanageable pressures on the NHS, even in Bolton, and infections, deaths, and hospitalisations nationally remain at their lowest level since last Summer.
“So I do not believe that we need, on the present evidence, to delay our roadmap, and we will proceed with our plan to move to step three in England from Monday.”
But he warned: “I have to level with you that this new variant could pose a serious disruption to our progress and could make it more difficult to move to step four in June. And I must stress that we will do whatever it takes to keep the public safe.” 

Telegraph
Boris Johnson on Friday warned that the Indian variant could “seriously disrupt” plans to lift the final Covid restrictions on June 21.
The Prime Minister said he must “level with” the public about the threat posed by the new strain and said “hard choices” about the route out of lockdown could lie ahead.
He warned the race between the vaccination programme and the virus was poised to become “a great deal tighter” because of the variant, and unveiled plans to bring forward second doses of Covid vaccines by a month.
The delay between doses for all over-50s and the clinically vulnerable will be slashed to eight weeks, and Mr Johnson said: “It’s more important than ever therefore that people get the additional protection of a second dose.”
He also announced plans to send the Army to hotspots hit hardest by the Indian variant, called B1.617.2, to support local leaders with a surge vaccination and testing plan. Soldiers will man mobile testing units and hand out tests on the street.
In Bolton and Blackburn, two of the areas with particularly high rates of the variant, a push to accelerate the take-up of the vaccine among eligible cohorts will begin, with plans including longer opening hours at jab sites. 

‘R’ 

Evening Standard
The estimated R number range in England has increased slightly from 0.8-1.0 to 0.8-1.1, according to the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage).
It means that on average every 10 people infected will go on to infect between 8 and 11 other people, meaning cases could still be falling – but it may also indicate a slight increase too.
Sage, which provides the estimates, said that R now spans 1 for some England regions.
However, it added these estimates do not necessarily mean R is definitively above 1 and that the epidemic is increasing, just that the uncertainty means it cannot be ruled out.
“This does not necessarily mean R is definitively above 1 and that the epidemic is increasing, but that the uncertainty means it cannot be ruled out,” it said. 

Rail travel 

Times
Ministers will pledge to introduce flexible rail season tickets, pay-as-you-go travel and enhanced compensation for delays as part of the biggest reform of the railway since privatisation almost three decades ago.
The government will publish a white paper next week aimed at radically improving the day-to-day operation of the railway, signalling a break with Conservative policy introduced under John Major in 1993.
Under the reforms, operation of the trains and tracks will be brought under the control of one new organisation — independent from the Department for Transport — to combat criticism that the existing system is too fragmented.
Industry sources say Sir Peter Hendy, the chairman of Network Rail, and Andrew Haines, the chief executive, will be asked to set up the new organisation. 

Flytipping 

Mail
Nearly 20,000 cases of fly-tipping occur each week, figures released today reveal.
In 2019/2020 local authorities in England had to deal with nearly 1million fly-tipping incidents, including clearing tyres, car bumpers and even a boat.
The number of court fines issued increased by 30 per cent to 2,671 over the same period with the total value hitting £1.09million – a 7 per cent rise on the previous year.
Councils are working hard to try to crack down on offenders, said the Local Government Association (LGA). It has urged everyone to dispose of their waste properly, using their nearest household waste recycling centre or at a private disposal company.
Councillor David Renard of the LGA said: ‘Fly-tipping is inexcusable. It is not only an eyesore for residents but a serious public health risk, creating pollution and attracting rats. It also costs local taxpayers almost £50million a year to clear up which could be better spent on other vital services.
‘Councils are determined to crack down on the problem. However, prosecuting fly-tippers often requires time-consuming and laborious investigations, with a high threshold of proof.’
He added: ‘With 20,000 incidents of fly-tipping a week, it is time the Government looks at its sentencing guidelines to ensure that those caught and prosecuted for fly-tipping receive significant fines that are recovered quickly to deter them from spoiling our parks, highways and verges again, and to help offset the huge costs to councils.’
Over a year, town halls dealt with 976,000 fly-tipping incidents.

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