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A8 WORLD NEWS
Wednesday 29 november 2017

Irish deputy PM quits to avert snap election as Brexit looms

By JILL LAWLESS a whistleblower exposing votes in parliament.
Associated Press corruption in Ireland's po- It comes at a sensitive time
LONDON (AP) — Ireland's lice force. in the Brexit process. EU
deputy prime minister re- They say newly disclosed leaders will decide at a
signed Tuesday to avert emails show Fitzgerald Dec. 14-15 summit wheth-
a parliamentary vote that knew about attempts by er there has been enough
would have collapsed the senior officers to discredit progress to start discussions
government and triggered the whistleblower earlier over Britain's future relations
a snap election at a crunch than she had previously ac- with the bloc.
time for Brexit negotiations. knowledged. A key barrier to progress is
Frances Fitzgerald quit Prime Minister Leo Varad- the Irish border. Varadkar
hours before lawmakers kar's Fine Gael party is pressing the U.K. to spell
had been due to vote on a backed Fitzgerald, and she out how it can keep the
no-confidence motion tar- denied wrongdoing. But currently invisible Ireland-
geting her, filed by opposi- she said in a statement that Northern Ireland frontier
tion party Fianna Fail. she had decided to "put free of customs posts and
She said she was stepping the national interest ahead other barriers when the U.K.
down "to avoid an unwel- of my own personal reputa- leaves the EU while Ireland
come and potentially de- tion." remains a member.
stabilizing general election Had Fitzgerald not re-
at this historically critical signed, the minority gov- The 310-mile (500-kilome-
time." ernment would almost cer- ter) frontier will be the U.K.'s
Fianna Fail wanted Fitzger- tainly have lost Tuesday's only land border with an EU
ald ousted over her involve- vote. country. Any hurdles to the
ment in a long-running po- Ireland's Deputy Prime Minister Frances Fitzgerald arrives at The resignation defuses movement of people or
lice scandal. Opposition Government Buildings in Dublin ahead of a vote of no confi- the immediate crisis, but goods could have serious
leaders accuse a previ- dence in the government Tuesday Nov. 28, 2017. Ireland's gov- has weakened Varadkar's implications for the econo-
ous government, in which erning party and main opposition are holding last-minute talks five-month-old govern- mies on both sides, and for
Fitzgerald was justice min- to avoid the government collapsing just as it faces a crunch ment, which relies on sup- Northern Ireland's peace
time in Brexit negotiations.
ister, of failing to defend (Brian Lawless/PA via AP) port from Fianna Fail to win process.q
UK banks seen more resilient to shocks _ even 'hard Brexit'

By PAN PYLAS recession. Stress tests have become a decade ago. years of the stress, the
Associated Press In its annual stress test of a key policy instrument of Included in the test was scale of which would have
LONDON (AP) — Britain's the sector, the central central banks since the the simulation of a 2.4 per- wiped out the capital base
most important lenders are bank said the country's global financial crisis. In cent fall in global GDP, a of the sector ten years ago.
strong enough to withstand seven biggest lenders, Britain's case, many of the 4.7 percent contraction in Since the crisis, banks have
a "disorderly Brexit" and such as Barclays and Lloyds country's banks, including Britain, a 33 percent crash been forced to boost their
could even weather an Bank, were "resilient" over- Royal Bank of Scotland, in house prices and a fur- capital buffers, which they
acute recession, the Bank all to adverse scenarios, had to be bailed out by ther 27 percent slide in the can draw upon in case of a
of England said Tuesday. including deep recessions taxpayers at the height of pound, which would take it financial shock to meet the
While concluding that they at home and abroad and the global crash in 2008 be- well below one-to-one with credit needs of individuals
would still have enough hefty falls in the price of as- cause they weren't strong the dollar. and businesses.
capital to provide credit to sets enough to cope with the The Bank of England esti- The central bank's Financial
households and businesses "Despite the severity of the shock. mated lenders, which also Policy Committee, which
if Britain crashes out of the tests, for the first time since In what is effectively a war- includes HSBC, Standard monitors the stability of
European Union without the bank began stress test- gaming exercise, the Bank Chartered, the British arm the banking system, also
a deal, the central bank ing in 2014, no bank needs of England tested banks' of Spain's Santander and concluded that banks can
warned that the picture to strengthen its capital ability to withstand a reces- Nationwide Building Soci- continue to support the
wouldn't be so clear-cut if a position as a result," Bank sion that is even worse than ety, would incur losses of economy if the country ex-
so-called 'hard Brexit' hap- of England Governor Mark the one that followed the around 50 billion pounds periences a "disorderly" exit
pens during a sharp global Carney said. global financial crisis nearly ($65 billion) in the first two from the EU.q