Ireland’s deputy Prime Minister resigns

It had looked as if a crisis involving the Irish Deputy Prime Minister Frances Fitzgerald might force a snap election. It was the last thing that the Irish public wanted or that the Irish government needed in the middle of crucial Brexit negotiations. In the end the deputy PM resigned, the crisis went away and with it the need for early elections.

This has only emboldened the position of the Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar who has the support of the EU in preventing Britain from moving to the next stage of Brexit talks about trade, unless it can show sufficient progress has been made on the thorny issue of the Irish border with Northern Ireland.