Ellen Coyne and Cormac McQuinn join Hugh Linehan to look back on the week in politics:

· Sinn Féin’s Planning for Constitutional Change Bill, which obliges the Government to draft and publish a Green Paper on unification within 18 months, failed to win support from Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, or independents.

· All Government TDs also voted against a PBP Bill to ban hare coursing. The Bill presented an issue where the party whip could have been spared in favour of a free vote, given the public’s clear support to outlaw the practice. The Bill was overwhelmingly defeated by 125 votes to 24.

· And this week saw Reform UK leader Nigel Farage and far-right French leader Marine Le Pen take the biggest political gambles of their respective careers.

Plus, the panel picks their favourite Irish Times pieces of the week:

· Graham Platner crashes and burns, dwindling swag bags for visiting journalists, and the derelict ‘Carlton’ site on O’Connell Street is snapped up by MetroLink.

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For Germany, football is often a reflection of the nations’ stability.

“When Germany is going well, things are going well on the pitch” Irish Times Berlin correspondent Derek Scally tells the Inside Politics podcast.

Following another premature exit from a world cup tournament they won only 12 years ago; in football, as in German politics, the future is uncertain.

Host Hugh Linehan asks where the major fault lines are in the upcoming federal elections in September. Elections, Scally explains, that are likely to be won by the far-right party Alternative for Deutschland (AfD) bar any major shifts.

“Establishment parties are seen as lacking ideas and energy” Scally says. “The sense of a government exhausting its political potential seems to be a general agreement around Berlin”.

Europe’s biggest economy is vulnerable on a number of fronts. It relies on Chinese manufacturing for its automotive sector, while facing major competition from increasingly popular, often cheaper, Chinese car makers.

Though the Christian Democrats’ Fredrick Merz has only been Chancellor for a year, “frustration” and “fatigue” are already creeping into public sentiment, Scally says.

Could his 34-point plan announced last week, including pension reforms, tax cuts, and business deregulation, turn things around?

Produced by Andrew McNair

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British MP Nigel Farage has resigned as an MP triggering a by-election in the constituency of Clacton-on-Sea which he says he will stand in.

It comes amid a row over his financial support, after The Sunday Times reported he had not declared benefits, including staff and security, received from his ally George Cottrell, who was convicted of fraud in the US.

“I’ve done nothing wrong” Farage said on a live stream provided by his UK Reform party and broadcast on British news channels.

Hugh speaks to our London Correspondent Mark Paul in the moments after the speech about what this move represents for British politics, and what happens next.

Produced by Andrew McNair.

Would you like to receive daily insights into world events delivered to your inbox? Sign up for Denis Staunton's Global Briefing newsletter here: irishtimes.com/newsletters/global-briefing/

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.