business

Collectors can fight to pay £7m for a Birkin – but the ‘it’ handbag is no longer cool | Lauren Cochrane

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The news that Jane Birkin’s original Hermès bag has sold for a record-breaking €8.6m (£7.4m) at auction will no doubt cause some jaws to drop to the floor. However, perhaps it should not surprise – this is a bag design that is often linked to eyewatering amounts of money. Forty years on from the prototype, … Read more

Young people don’t feel part of the EU – and they’re right | Francesco Grillo

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The former Italian prime minister Mario Draghi produced his much-awaited prescription for how to reboot Europe’s economy last year. The Draghi report was rightly applauded as a rude awakening for a European Union that is far too complacent about its own obsolescence. Draghi concluded that an €800bn-a-year public spending boost would be needed to end … Read more

The Guardian view on Starmer and Macron’s Channel crossings deal: safe routes hold the key to future progress | Editorial

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To use a football analogy that he might appreciate, the first year of Sir Keir Starmer’s premiership has been a game of two halves. Domestically, grievous strategic mistakes have been made. On the foreign stage, however, an approach that Sir Keir likes to style as “quiet, serious diplomacy” has yielded some tangible results. For the … Read more

A rightwing minister told Sweden to get tough on crime – until his own son was caught in a Nazi scandal | Martin Gelin

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Before the elections next year, Sweden’s conservative government has been eager to avoid accusations of racism or xenophobia. So it’s unfortunate that it keeps being plagued by scandals involving both. The Swedish investigative magazine Expo revealed earlier this month that a minister in the governing coalition, whom it did not name, had a close family … Read more

Yvette Cooper avoids criticising Macron’s attack on Brexit as she defends migrant deal – UK politics live | Politics

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Britain expects EU to approve migration deal with France, says Cooper Yesterday Keir Starmer and Emmanuel Macron published a leaders’ declaration that implied the returns agreement would need EU sign-off. They were not very clear about this, but the Times led its main story on this on the suggestion that the EU might block the … Read more

Trial UK and France ‘one in, one out’ scheme designed to curb migrant boat crossings to start within weeks – as it happened | Politics

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Starmer confirms ‘ground-breaking returns pilot’ scheme will start operating in coming weeks Starmer moves to illegal migration. This is a global crisis, he says. But it is also “acutely” a crisis for UK and France. An enterprise run by criminals is leading hundreds of people to their deaths in the Channel. They have agreed “a … Read more

Robert Jenrick’s migrant returns advice is finally heeded – by a Labour PM | Immigration and asylum

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As Rishi Sunak prepared to meet Emmanuel Macron in March 2023, his migration minister wrote to him to propose some radical proposals that might persuade the French to crack down on small boat crossings. “We should be willing to make highly meaningful concessions such as offering to take one asylum seeker that has been successfully … Read more

The Guardian view on Ukraine’s future: Putin may be gaining ground, but he is not winning | Editorial

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European leaders gathered in Rome on Thursday for a conference on Ukrainian recovery, but endurance remains the priority. Russia has intensified its assault with punishing strikes far beyond the frontline – including a record 728 drones and 13 missiles one day before the conference. The UN said that civilian casualties last month were at their … Read more