Matt Frei , Europe Editor and Presenter

Germany’s outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel has backed her centre-right party’s candidate Armin Laschet to succeed her, as Germans head to the polls tomorrow.

From Switzerland, we spoke to Professor Matt Qvortrup, who has written Angela Merkel’s biography.

Angela Merkel has done something rather rare in European politics these days. 

We spoke to Pauline Brünger, a student and climate activist, who was among the organisers of the Fridays for Future demonstrations across Germany, and Marina Weisband, a political activist and author who first arrived in Germany as a refugee from Ukraine.

Oktoberfest has been downsized thanks to Covid, but German politics has gone into full and final gear before Sunday’s election. 

In Germany and across Europe, governments are desperate to appease angry consumers who see their bills rising. 

German Green Party MEP Reinhard Bütikofer claims the party will be the “strongest ever” after the country’s elections, adding the group is ready to stand up for human rights and foreign policy.

Today the Greens poll around 17 per cent of the vote. It had been higher this summer and many thought the devastating floods, widely blamed on climate change, would make all the difference. But did they? 

We were joined by Sir David King, chair of the Climate Crisis Advisory Group, which provides analysis of global warming by independent scientists from across the globe.

Price rises across Europe have also soared to their highest for years – a combination of unseasonably cold weather in the spring pushing up demand, and pandemic-hit economies struggling to build up new supplies.

Ed Davey, the leader of the Liberal Democrats, has given his keynote speech at the party’s annual conference today, pledging to smash down the Tory’s blue wall. 

We spoke to Andrew Opie, who is the director of food and sustainability at the British Retail Consortium.

We spoke to Evan Osnos, journalist at the New Yorker magazine and author of Joe Biden’s 2020 autobiography and Wildland: The Making of America’s Fury.

China is not happy about the new security pact formed by the UK, Australia and the United States, describing it as “extremely irresponsible” and “severely damaging regional peace”.

Take away fuel, take away water, take away a functioning government and it doesn’t take long for an entire country to implode.