Olaf Scholz – challenges on all sides

Olaf Scholz was sworn in this morning as next German Chancellor, replacing Angela Merkel, who will be a hard act to follow. He takes on a coalition government with three parties which have never governed together before. Added to which he is facing a fourth covid wave with street protests about mandatory  vaccinations for all; depressing business figures and  inflation at 6 per cent, its highest level since the early 1990s. There’s a foreign policy crisis brewing over Russia and