Research

But think-tank boss Charles Grant said that Germany will not let Juncker get away with his “delusional” EU vision, which includes allowing the richer northern Europe to pay for the poorer areas of southern Europe. Mr Grant, who is the Director of the Centre for European Reform, told BBC Radio 4: “[Juncker] believes that the Eurozone, in order to survive, needs to federalise. “That you need to have more integrated policy making system so that the richer countries, mainly Germany, transfer money to help the poorer countries like Italy and Greece and help them to flourish inside the eurozone.” 

Charles Grant, the director of the Centre for European Reform in London, said that he supported the EU’s tax crackdown and the way that Vestager is standing up to the technology companies. “On the other hand, it’s also true that Germany sees the commission as a vehicle to protect its own digital industries. So how much of this is principle, and how much is to protect local industries?”

Samuel Lowe from the Centre for European Reform think-tank has posted an interesting thread on the single market on Twitter. It starts here.
Samuel Lowe: A truck crosses a border carrying meat without need for customs or safety checks. The driver doesn't need a visa. The truck company is allowed to operate in both countries. There's a reason the single market and customs union exist and look the way they do.

Charles Grant, director of the Center for European Reform, said: “Many EU governments recognise that the transition will need to last beyond December 2020. “But it suits the EU, like the UK, not to talk about that now. “The UK would have to pay for single market access, which would require a new and difficult negotiation.”

Insiders say hostility from Germany remains Charles Grant, the director of the Centre for European Reform, said: “German officials worry that clever British diplomacy would – with this model – enable the UK to ‘cherry-pick’ the bits of the single market that the UK wants to stay in, while it spurned those parts of the market it disliked."

Agata Gostynska-Jakubowska, a senior research fellow at the Centre for European Reform, said Wednesday's parliamentary vote would do little to change the mood in Brussels regarding Brexit. "They [EU leaders] have been pretty clear that negotiations have come to an end," Gostynska-Jakubowska told Al Jazeera.

As Charles Grant, director of the Centre for European Reform, puts it. “The EU-27 do not take the threat of a UK walk out very seriously, believing that the consequences of no deal, while bad for the EU economy, would be catastrophic for the UK economy".

Steve Baker, a Brexit minister, refused to dismiss a claim that civil servants were rigging their Brexit analyses to show that the UK should stay in the customs union. The claim was made by the Tory Brexiter Jacob Rees-Mogg. He asked Baker if he had heard the claim from Charles Grant, director of the Centre for European Reform, that “officials in the Treasury have deliberately developed a model to show that all options other than staying in the customs union were bad and that officials intended to use this to influence policy”.