A green wave has just swept Europe

As Brits understandably focus on Brexit and populism, another story is emerging: the green wave. It is especially focused in amongst the young and in cities: Greens took nine of Germany’s ten largest cities, sometimes by large margins. Across Germany, Die Grünen relegated the Social Democrats to third place. In France, Les Verts came from nowhere to finish third, greens came second in Finland and broke into double digits in Austria and The Netherlands. In Ireland, Greens trebled their share of the vote and won their first European Parliament seat for 20 years: an exit poll showed 90 per cent of voters thought the Irish government needs to do more on climate change. And it was a doubling of the Green vote that forced the Tories into a humiliating fifth place in the UK. The score in the European Parliament is that the Greens now have 70 seats, which is quite the upset, 20 more than had been expected.