8 LISTENER FEBRUARY 29 2020
BULLETIN FROM ABROAD
sensitive question of who will make
up the almost €7 billion hole left in
the EU budget by Britain’s departure.
More than 460,000 German jobs are
tied to about €100 billion worth of
annual exports to the UK. But that
still feels abstract. Today, the average
German is more likely to be asking
whether they need a visa to visit
Buckingham Palace.I
t’s more complicated for the
average Briton in Europe. They’re
wondering whether they didn’t
get the job they applied for with the
(insert name of European country
here) firm because of uncertain resi-
dence status. They’re confused about
health insurance, pensions, spousal
rights, voting rights, the rights of
their cats, dogs and pet ferrets and
whether EU rules on cheap mobile
phone calls still apply. Most will get
to stay where they have settled in
Europe – but nobody knows what will
happen to them when they
go on holiday in 2021.
Ah, and then there’s
Colin, who started a social-
media storm this month,
standing in an immigration
queue in Amsterdam. “Abso-
lutely disgusting service at
Schiphol Airport,” he fumed
on Twitter. “55 minutes
we have been stood in the
immigration queue. This
isn’t the Brexit I voted for.”
Well, not quite, Colin,
more than 37,400 social-
media users swiftly
responded. But, hey, maybe
next year. lS
o, it finally happened. At the
end of last month, the UK left
the European Union. Jubilant
Brexiteers, wearing T-shirts
saying “Fcuk the EU”, celebrated
by getting drunk and trampling
blue-and-gold EU flags into a muddy
London lawn. Remainer relatives in
England sent us mournful emails.
And European MPs in Brussels
brought a tear to everyone’s eye, with
a rousing version of Auld Lang Syne. It
was all so emotional.
Until the day after in Berlin, when
it wasn’t. Despite the drunks and
drama in London, and the
overwrought farewells, it
was surprising how much of
a non-event it felt like here.
Sure, Brexit was front-page
news, but other than the
headline, it was hard to
discern that anything had
changed.
Most Germans still don’t
understand. The Brexit level
of self-sabotage is hard to
comprehend unless you’re
personally acquainted
with misplaced nostalgia
for the British empire and
decades of ugly EU cover-
age by doom-dealing British
tabloids. So, now, with a
collective, multinational
sigh of both resignation and
relief, Europeans seemedPost-Brexit,
Germans back a
hard line and poor
Colin is stuck in a
passport queue.
The morning after
Tweeted Colin:
“55 minuteswe have been
stood in thequeue. This
isn’t the Brexit
I voted for.”JA
SO
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AD
AM
K
AT
ZE
NS
TE
IN
/T
HE
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AR
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ON
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AN
K
glad to quietly acknowledge January 31 as the last
in a series of annoying political cliff-hangers and,
most likely, also to see the back of Nigel Farage and
his merry band of flag-waving morons in Brussels.
Britain and the EU will now thrash out new deals
on everything from trade to transport. Talks begin
in March and must be finished by the end of 2020.
EU politicians recently met in Strasbourg to decide
their negotiating strategy: tough, with no new con-
cessions. Ordinary EU citizens appear to agree. In
a recent online poll of more than 15,000 German
readers by Der Spiegel magazine, 91% said the EU
should be harder on Britain.
They may be right. Analysts have suggested that
Boris Johnson’s recent Cabinet reshuffle means he
now has ministers who won’t oppose him when he
starts breaking last year’s promises. “We’re talking
to the same [British] representatives, but they’re
acting very differently now,” Katarina Barley,
German vice-president of the European Parliament,
recently told journalists.
Mostly, though, Britain’s “liberation” from the
evil EU seems to have come and gone here with
surprisingly little fanfare. Maybe it’s because the
Germans currently have less to lose. There’s theCATHRIN
SCHAER
IN BERLIN
Cathrin Schaer is editor-in-chief
of Iraqi news website Niqash.
org, based in Berlin.