Europe must never repeat Brexit, says Guy Verhofstadt

The European parliament’s Brexit coordinator, Guy Verhofstadt, has warned that the UK’s decision to leave the EU has already done “far more damage than has ever been predicted”. Appearing alongside the Liberal Democrat leader, Vince Cable, at a European election campaign event in Camden, north London, on Friday morning, the leader of the Alliance for Liberals and Democrats for Europe said he wanted to send a message to people on the continent to “never repeat Brexit again”. Verhofstadt, a former prime minister of Belgium, has been criticised for comments he made in a BBC documentary, in which he joked that Olly Robbins, the UK’s chief negotiator, had asked him for Belgian citizenship. His aide was also recorded describing Theresa May’s actions as insane and pathetic. Asked about the comments, Verhofstadt said the description of the prime minister had been taken out of context and the Robbins anecdote was “a funny joke. Where is your British sense of humour? I hope that in Brexit you don’t lose that. Your famous sense of humour.”