Is Sir Keir Starmer's cautious ‘reset’ with Europe enough to undo the damage done by Brexit? | Andrew Rawnsley

It makes sense, at the level of basic diplomacy, in the pursuit of common geostrategic interests and to please many of his own party’s supporters, for Sir Keir to strive to improve relations between the UK and its neighbours. There are signs for thinking that the effort is being reciprocated. At a joint news conference, the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, another man of the centre-left, expressed dismay that links between his country and Britain had decayed since Brexit while declaring: “We want to grasp this outstretched hand.” From being a byword for unreliablity and unpredictability under the revolving door of Tory prime ministerships, the UK now looks like a fixed point in a churning world. Sir Keir is a fit man in his early sixties in possession of a huge parliamentary majority. He looks extremely likely to be around for a while.