EU: normal disservice resumes

In the past few months, relations between the UK and the EU have been the best they have been since Brexit. Vladimir Putin’s assault on Ukraine reminded the two sides of the need for the world’s democracies to co-operate. Disputes over fishing rights could wait.

It is tempting to hope that relations could continue to improve, especially now that the French presidential election is out of the way. But this is unlikely to happen. This week Bruno Le Maire, France’s economy minister, dismissed the suggestion that fixing relations with Britain will be a priority for Emmanuel Macron’s second term.

In Whitehall there is a recognition that there won’t be a dramatic improvement in Anglo-French relations, given how many of the difficulties come down to the personalities of the two leaders. ‘Boris and Macron is tricky,’ one source tells me. ‘They thought they understood each other. They are both zeitgeist politicians.’