Matthew Lynn

Matthew Lynn is a financial columnist and author of ‘Bust: Greece, The Euro and The Sovereign Debt Crisis’ and ‘The Long Depression: The Slump of 2008 to 2031’

The UK’s vaccine roll-out has ended the Brexit debate

The country would remain implacably divided for a generation, with Remain and Leave replacing class and geography as the new fault line in British politics. International investors would take a generation to come round to the idea. And campaigns to re-join the EU would grow in strength as the chaos deepened. Even a few months

The economic cost of the EU’s vaccine catastrophe

It didn’t order enough vaccines, spent too little money, dithered over authorisation and then lashed out at the companies making them. Over the last few weeks, the catastrophe of the European Union’s vaccine roll-out has become painfully clear to everyone. We are already starting to see the toll it is taking on the continent’s health,

The next stage of the EU’s coronavirus meltdown

Debts would be shared. The strong would offer a helping hand to the weak. Money would be raised at incredibly cheap rates to help countries recover from the impact of Covid-19, while at the same time building back a greener, tech-based economy. Last summer, as the epidemic engulfed the continent, the European Union took a

Europe’s panic: what’s behind their vaccine meltdown?

39 min listen

As the EU threatens a vaccine export ban, is their blind panic a sign of incoming crisis? (1:15) Plus, will a new Instagram account for teenage girls to report sexual assault restart a battle of the sexes? (18:05) And finally, what is it like to be one of the last British babies born under the

Europe’s panic: the meltdown over vaccines

The Dutch city of Leiden has rarely played a dramatic role in European history. Quiet, rainy and tucked away close to the sea, it is in many ways the Durham of the Continent. It was besieged by the Spanish in the Eighty Years’ War, Rembrandt was born and worked there, Einstein taught intermittently at its

Boris is right: ‘greed’ did give us the Covid vaccine

Boris Johnson might have started back-pedalling furiously. He might have tried to dismiss it as an off-the-cuff comment. And the spin doctor might have preferred it to have remained private. Even so, the Prime Minister was surely right when he told MPs last night that ‘greed’ and ‘capitalism’ gave us the Covid-19 vaccine. And rather than

Could the Green party revive Germany’s fortunes?

The BMWs and Mercs will be banned from the autobahns. People will only have electricity when there is enough of a breeze to keep the windmills turning. And the factories will be on a three-day week, while the airports will be converted into organic farms. Most businesses, and of course conservatives of any sort, will

The EU’s ugly vaccine nationalism

We have to rid the world of vaccine nationalism. No one is protected until we are all protected. And we need, above all, solidarity to fight a virus which by its nature does not respect borders or boundaries. Over much of the last year, European Union officials, led by the President of the Commission Ursula

Rishi Sunak is turning into a Gordon Brown tribute act

Lots of self-promotion. An avalanche of leaks. Fiddly tax changes that always somehow turn out to be an increase, plenty of creative double counting, and heavy spending on marginal seats, all wrapped up in a package designed to effortlessly transport its author into Number 10. Remind you of anyone? It is of course Gordon Brown,

Can the EU be trusted to introduce vaccine passports?

The contracts were badly drafted. The orders were late. Too few resources were made available for the scale of the task, and the regulators dithered and delayed. Even the most fanatical federalists such as Guy Verhofstadt have admitted the EU’s vaccine programme was little short of a catastrophe. But hey, what does that matter? Ursula

Spectator Out Loud: Katy Balls, Matthew Lynn and Craig Brown

33 min listen

On this episode, Katy Balls explains how No. 10 infighting could lose Scotland, and reveals how Boris plans to get his side in order. (01:05) Matthew Lynn is next on the show, and tells the story of the Up Crash. (10:10) Craig Brown finishes the podcast, reading his review of a ‘dark portrait of sibling

Up Crash: why are markets soaring as the economy tanks?

Shops are boarded up. More than four million people are on furlough with little idea of whether they will have jobs to go back to. Global trade has hit levels last seen a decade ago, and government deficits are soaring, while most developed economies have seen output shrink by 10 per cent, a collapse not

The problem with the Supreme Court’s Uber ruling

They are monitored by the firm. They don’t have the option of working for other companies. And they are entitled to all the protections that come with being an employee. The Supreme Court today potentially blew up Uber’s business model, and the model of many other fast-growing ‘gig economy’ companies as well, with a ruling

Biden’s rift with Brussels is only set to grow

It was meant to be a special relationship. After the tumultuous Trump years, President Biden was planning to reset relations with the European Union, Inherently liberal, rules-based, and engaged with climate change, it would be a natural ally, and far more so than a UK still tainted by Brexit. The Biden team were no doubt

Von der Leyen has learnt nothing from the EU’s vaccine fiasco

As non-apology apologies go, it was right up there with the best of them. Speaking to MEPs today, the president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen accepted that some ‘mistakes had been made’ in the procurement of vaccines against Covid-19.  Apparently the Commission had been a little too late authorising some of the

Barclays has woken up to the good news about Brexit

The bankers would all move to Frankfurt. The hedge funds would all decamp to Zurich. The asset managers would be off to Paris and Dublin, and the lawyers, accountants and consultants would swiftly follow them.  For much of the last four years since the UK voted to leave the European Union, it has been assumed

The vaccine disaster has fatally undermined the EU

It might be a bit late, but the supply will come on tap eventually. France’s Sanofi has partnered with Pfizer to start manufacturing its vaccine. BioNTech has just bought a factory in Marburg, Germany from Switzerland’s drugs giant Novartis to retrofit into a vaccine plant. With plenty of money being splashed around, production will arrive

Ursula von der Leyen has broken the first rule of leadership

Valdis Dombrovskis could probably do without his moment in the limelight. His spell as prime minister of Latvia, a country with a population of 1.9 million, was largely successful, at least until the collapse of a supermarket roof in 2014 brought his coalition to an early end.  Shunted off to Brussels, he worked quietly as