The Brexit Party Manifesto (sort of)

The Brexit party is leading the polls in the upcoming EU elections – but they don’t have a manifesto. So we’ve written one for them:

Brexit:

Leaving the EU is the easiest thing in the world. We simply leave and go on to WTO rules. Remoaning naysayers like Nick Clegg insist that a ‘great power’ like the UK can’t do that because we will wreck the economy, make ourselves an international pariah and be forced to live off tinned spam. To which we say “Yum!” And anyway – we won’t be eating spam. You will.

Yummy

WTO rules:

East Timor, Somalia and Western Sahara all trade solely under WTO rules and do absolutely fine. Nobody questions their ability to export sandalwood, hides and second hand AK47s into emerging markets. While Britain is obliged to engage with the EU, the biggest market in the world, on the most favourable terms of any country on Earth, Somalia is enjoying robust trade with Djibouti and parts of war torn Eritrea. Enough is enough frankly. We are leaving and we are going to take a slice of that trade with Djibouti whether Angela Merkel likes it or not.

Fishing:

The UK fishing industry contributes less GDP to our economy than Harrods and employs fewer people than Poundsaver so it is quite right that we sacrifice every other industry in the UK to ensure that a few fishermen can drive stocks to extinction. The reason is simple. Nigel likes fishing. It’s his hobby and moreover his favourite book as a child was ‘the ladybird book of fishermen’. Then there’s Jane Mummery, one of our prospective MEPs. Jane is managing director of Lowestoft fishing auctions and more fish means more business for her. Why should the UK have an automotive and aeronautical sector when Jane can’t make more money?

Nigel’s favourite book

Sex education in schools:

A life sized inflatable of Ann Widdecombe, looking angry, to be placed in every classroom with a balloon coming out of her mouth saying “Stop that revolting nonsense right now!”

The NHS:

As our MEP candidate Annunziata Rees-Mogg puts it: “Nobody I know uses the NHS. If we can afford private healthcare on top of the school fees, servants’ wages, repairs on the roofs of our stately homes and all those skiing trips and safaris – then why can’t ordinary people who send their children to secondary moderns?”

5G network and superfast broadband:

Nigel doesn’t use the internet – he says: “Let’s shut this wasteful project down and return to the penny post instead.”

Immigration:

Immigration will be limited to the many foreign born girlfriends and wives of our leaders and financial backers. Evidence if ever it were needed that immigrants take on the very nastiest jobs that nobody else is prepared to do.

Defence:

The greatest risk facing this country comes not from Russia or an expansionist China – but the threat posed by the Belgian navy. They’ve been quiet far too long and as Richard Tice says: “those mussel guzzling ersatz Frenchmen are probably up to something”. For every ship the Belgian navy builds we intend to build two. The rest of it will be plagiarized from the letters page of Richard Tice’s favourite comic.

Defence policy

Homelessness:

Annunziata again: “Homelessness is a choice. If one has left university and can’t afford rents in Mayfair one should jolly well go home and slum it in one’s parents’ spare wing!”

Foreign Policy

Britain’s historic role has been to suck up to the United States of America. Why should we be leading the EU when we can be told what to do by Donald Trump? ‘The Donald’ as Nigel affectionately calls him – has promised us that we can have whatever trade deal America decides to give us, on terms dictated by them, at any time they so choose. If that’s not enough to get Nigel a job on the Fox Network then we really don’t know what is.

We want your suggestions:

Please add any further ideas in the comments below.

OBVIOUSLY SATIRE. No threatening emails please.

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The Journey South with Captain Farage. Nigel’s diary of the great March to Leave – exclusive

We arrive in Sunderland. Just one night here before we crack on to London in the morning. I have chosen Tice, Hoey and Jenkyns as my team to make the final long march south. The world is watching. We rest up in our hotel. The restaurant is perfectly decent – a good wine list and the filet mignon isn’t too shabby.

I’ve always loved roughing it.

The view of Sunderland from my bedroom window

6.50 a.m.

Dawn breaks over Sunderland but as we set out for the rendezvous point news reaches us that the Remoaners are also marching on London. It is now a race to the South.

The world’s press greet us.

“Good luck in this!” The nice man from Russia Today bids us politely “our President Vladimir Putin stand behind you as you bring about destruction of the EU and West – he give you our personal warm wish”.

Such a refreshing change from the ghastly BBC who clearly think this important and significant expedition is a joke! The MSM would like nothing more than for our voices to be ignored…… as I say every time they invite me on to one of their shows – or in my nightly broadcasts on LBC.

Soon we are marching along a well paved footpath – just next to the A19.

A well earned drink after the gruelling first day

8.45 a.m.

The sky and surface merge into a great sea of paleness as Hoey witters on about her cats and Tice stares forlornly into the distance muttering “I thought more people would turn out” over and over again. We are joined for the first leg of the trip by a man who introduces himself as Chris819173 from Blackburn. He seems to think I should know who he is ‘from twitter’. Apparently I once liked one of his tweets. He seems harmless enough and offers me a sip from the large bottle of Strongbow he’s carrying.

I politely decline and ask him if he’s met Hoey. But neither seems interested in speaking to the other.

Then he produces an enormous crusader helmet from a bag and pops it on his head.

Good chap!

Chris819173 takes a well earned rest

10 a.m.

After a mile or so in the pelting rain Jenkyns starts to complain about a stone in her shoe and we are forced to seek shelter in a bus stop while she empties her boot.

“Come on Jenkyns! This is a race now!” I cry. “Can’t let the Remoaners win”. I also have a luncheon appointment at 12 and the reservation can’t be moved.

Chris819173 is further slowing our progress. As Jenkyns tries to get her boot back on, he starts banging his helmet against the shelter and shouting about Soros and Tim Farron. We can’t hear exactly what he is saying on account of the helmet.

Tice helps Chris pull it off while Hoey tells us about the time she went on holiday with Andy Wigmore.

“Such a gentleman” she says “always opens the door for you”.

“I’m just going into the bushes” Chris819173 interrupts, to the relief of all “I may be gone some time”.

It’s an extraordinarily noble gesture.

I quickly gather the rest of our party together and move on. Chris819173 has sacrificed himself for the greater good of my luncheon plans – much as millions of ordinary Brexiters have – and it is important that we honour his selflessness by getting away from him as quickly as possible. Jenkyns still hasn’t got her boot on and Hoey is trying to tell me about the time her cat Freddy “the cheeky one” fell through the roof of a shed and broke some pots.

By God! This is an awful place.

11 a.m.

“How much further is it?” I demand of Tice as we go up a slight incline.

“Just another 280 miles!” He shouts over the din of the rain and people shouting “fuck off you pointless twats” from their car windows.

“Not to London! To the rendezvous point where I am getting picked up by a bus”.

Tice stares at me incredulously, Hoey is now talking about “Arthur” and the funny things he does with string – she tries to show me photos on her phone despite the unrelenting torrent. And then – to my horror – I see Chris819173 emerging from the bushes 300 yards behind us. He’s lost his trousers and his pants and is shouting about the Rothschilds while swigging his cider.

“Run!” I order – and we pick up the pace – despite Jenkyns still not having put her boot on. Somehow Chris is gaining on us even as we wheeze along the path.

And then – just as all hope seems to be lost I spot the coach.

Thank God.

I climb aboard – and give a hearty wave to the rest of the team as I am driven away. Chris819173 has managed to climb onto the bumper but a couple of sharp turns later and he has ‘rejoined the march.’

They know I will be back and that my heart is with them as they go. In the meantime – God Speed – and onwards to lunch!

Don’t worry – I made it in time for lunch

To be continued……..

Satirical content – as told to Otto English

Enoch was wrong – precisely the reason we should listen to his speech

The BBC will tonight broadcast Enoch Powell’s notorious ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech in full for the first time in its Archive on 4 series. The speech, which will be read by actor Ian McDiarmid will be topped, tailed and interspersed with academic and expert commentary aiming to give it context.

This has caused predictable controversy in many corners with Lord Adonis, among others, demanding that the broadcast be binned. I confess that my initial instinct was along the same lines. We live in febrile times. The Leave EU/Faragist camp are delighted and if Arron Banks’ mob think something is a grand idea it’s a fairly good indicator that it is not. But now, having read the speech and a host of comments and commentaries around it I feel that the BBC is doing exactly the right thing – and here’s why.

Leave EU has been busy

It would be an understatement to say that Enoch Powell was and remains a controversial and divisive figure. Scholastically gifted he was awarded a double starred first in classics at Trinity College Cambridge and following a distinguished academic and military career went into politics as a Conservative MP.

Powell’s views and record in parliament were often at stark odds with his later caricature as a rabid racist. In 1959, at the height of the ‘Mau Mau’ insurrection against British rule in Kenya he delivered a furious speech in the House of Commons in which he condemned the British government for forcibly relocating thousands of Kikuyu tribes-people and lambasted fellow Tory MP John Peel for calling the Mau Mau ‘subhuman’. In this case at least – Enoch was right.

As Minister for Health he oversaw the recruitment of thousands of Commonwealth citizens into the NHS – but his period of office was marred by controversy over the thalidomide catastrophe and his unsympathetic handling of the victims of it. The mid to late 1960s saw the Conservatives in opposition and an increasingly frustrated Powell serving as the Shadow Minister for Defence.

By 1968 – he was a late middle aged man in a hurry. His childhood ambition to be Viceroy of India had been replaced by a burning desire to lead the Conservative party and make his mark as Prime Minister. With two years to go until a general election he needed to raise his profile and seize the reins of the party from the lacklustre Edward Heath and while the context (great thread here) of the ‘Rivers of Blood’ is important, at the time, many saw it as a bold and unambiguous bid for the leadership.

Powell delivered the speech on April 20^th 1968 – on what incidentally would have been Adolf Hitler’s 79^th birthday. The packed hall at the Birmingham Conservative Association included members of the press and an ATV camera crew who had been tipped off in advance. The address caused immediate controversy and was broadly and depressingly popular with the general public. A Gallup poll found that 74% of the British public ‘agreed’ with his sentiments. The Times and Guardian lambasted Powell who, in turn, threatened to sue The Sunday Times for branding him a ‘racialist.’

Enoch was wrong

Until this week I had never read the speech. You can view it in full here and whatever your preconceived views, left right or Adonis, I would recommend it. What is striking is just how obnoxious, unpleasant, inane and brutally racist it is. The most famous and oft repeated lines about the ‘River Tiber foaming with much blood’ have leant lie to the accepted notion that Powell’s words are somehow infused with his classical scholarship. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Over the course of several thousand words Powell lurches from unconvincing yarn to unfounded hypothesis and back again. Most striking are the two anecdotes. The first tells the story of a curiously anonymous constituent who takes our Enoch by the arm in the street one day and without a shred of irony starts to bang on about immigrants and how he won’t rest until his children have er…. settled overseas…. ending with the prediction that:

“In this country in 15 or 20 years’ time the black man will have the whip hand over the white man.”

The second story relates to a mysterious correspondent in Wolverhampton; a war widow who in the passing of just eight years has found herself the last white resident in a street full of black people. This woman has made a living out of renting rooms – but now discovers that the only tenants she can get are ‘negroes’ and rather than do that she opts instead to leave her home empty and get no rent.

“When she goes to the shops” Powell continues “she is followed by children, charming, wide-grinning piccaninnies. They cannot speak English, but one word they know. “Racialist,” they chant.”

Powell dots the speech with statistics, cheap racist epithets and predictions along lines similar to far right tropes today. He predicts essentially that eventually there will be more descendants of (specifically black) immigrants than white ‘indigenous’ Britons – before making his chilling ‘Rivers of Blood’ prediction.

Despite the exposure – Powell was sacked

For a man supposedly gifted with academic brilliance and oratory power it’s a dog’s whistle dinner of a speech.  A contemporary Times leader summed it up thus:

“This is the first time that a serious British politician has appealed to racial hatred in this direct way in our post-war history.”

The speech is ugly in every way; ugly in tone, ugly in language and ugly in intent. These are the words of a racist mug who has calculated that the braying mob will rally to him if he plays on their fears.

Decent people judged his words disgusting in the day and the passage of time has not been any kinder.

2018 is not 1968. The country has moved on and moved on considerably. Most British people in 2018 are not racist in the way that most British people probably were in 1968. Most British people (one hopes) can distinguish virtuous political sentiment from evil intent. But more importantly – Enoch has been proven utterly wrong. There has been no racial war. On the contrary, British multi-culturalism has been a success. Those of us who live in thriving multi-cultural neighbourhoods have friends and colleagues from all races and my black neighbour is more likely to help me change a flat tyre or lend me some hedge clippers than ever cast his whip hand over me. The dark foreboding prophecies have been invalidated and as such, suggestions that the speech should be removed from the airwaves simply add fuel to the small but vociferous far right mob and cries of ‘snowflakes.’

Banning things is counter-productive. In the case of Rivers of Blood, I say do the opposite. Broadcast it far and wide, read it, teach it in schools, show it up for what it is and in so doing show us all how far we have travelled. Mr Farage in particular views Enoch Powell as an inspiration – perhaps in reflecting on the ideological font of the modern far right anti-migrant movement – the true rancidity of that crusade will be exposed for what it is.

Putin’s Lord Haw Haws – why does the UK continue to tolerate Russian propagandists and useful idiots?

Theresa May delivered a sombre assessment yesterday on the attack on Russian defector Sergei Skripal, his daughter Yulia and the valiant police officer Detective Sergeant Nick Bailey, who went to their aid when they were poisoned with toxic nerve agent – Novichok. Mrs May told MPs it was ‘highly likely’ that the Russian State was responsible for the “brazen attempt to murder citizens on our soil” and has given the Putin government until midnight tonight (13^th March 2018) to respond. If no reply is forthcoming the Prime Minister has indicated that the government will conclude that this attack was a deliberate “unlawful use of force” by Russia.

The Russian state’s response so far has been predictably dismissive and the wheels of propaganda swiftly turned. Mrs May’s comments were ‘provocative’ and a ‘circus show in the British parliament.’

This is but the latest in a string of bizarre deaths and assassination attempts in the UK of former Russian spies and emigres – most famously Alexander Litvinenko. In the past the UK government has been accused of ‘turning a blind eye’ to these attacks and this perhaps has emboldened the FSB/agents of the Kremlin to the extent that they feel they can brashly murder people in broad daylight on the streets of Salisbury – and put hundreds of British lives at risk in the process.

Vladimir Putin on RT

Anyone who cares about Britain should be deeply concerned about this – and Russia’s dismissive and discourteous unwillingness to co-operate. This attack is terrorism plain and simple and whoever is behind it should be brought to justice. If the protagonist is the machine of the Russian state then there is no comparable assault on our nation by a major country in modern times.

Incredibly however, since the poisoning of Skripal, his daughter and Nick Bailey on the 4^th of March – some of the loudest self-professed patriots in the land have been strangely silent. Nigel Farage, for example, has made just two mentions of the events in his twitter feed. Once – when publicising his LBC show and once (indirectly) when asked by Kevin Maguire whether he still venerated Vladimir Putin. Farage is on record as saying that Mr Putin is the world leader he most admires and has appeared many times on the Russian State propaganda channel RT – even being offered his own show. But ‘straight talking Nigel’ declined to give a straight answer.

In the two LBC shows in which Farage has (presumably been obliged) to discuss Skripal – he has been very careful indeed not to criticise the Russian leader and suggested, instead that Mrs May should reach out to him, sit down with him and ‘thrash it out.’ Mr Farage – who for years has branded Mrs May ‘Theresa the appeaser’ has clearly never looked up the word ‘irony’ in his dictionary.

Nigel is not alone in his near silence on Skripal. Arron Banks’ Westmonster ‘has made one brief mention of it; right wing website Breitbart London – edited by UKIP acolyte Raheem Kassam has, between dozens of tweets and articles about rampant knife crime in Sadiq’s London, made two. One of those focused mainly on criticism of the UK government’s handling of events. Across the board, the majority of what might be termed ‘Brexit accounts’ have spent the week bleating about a Canadian right wing extremist, Lauren Southern, being denied entry to the UK for her views (yes I know). The few tweets Westmonster and others have sent have left trails of comments beneath them from dim witted ‘nationalists’ and obvious Russian trolls blaming the attack on (variously) the Jews, Soros, or the British authorities themselves. There is also a widely circulated rumour doing the rounds that as Porton Down is just a few miles from Salisbury – MI6 did it.

George Galloway – useful idiot?

By contrast to his fellow Grassroots Out colleagues, former MP George Galloway has been anything but silent. His twitter feed has been buzzing with conspiracy theories and with good reason. With all those ex-wives, Galloway has bills to pay and as Putin’s highest paid propagandist he is obviously putting in some overtime. You see gorgeous George Galloway earns hundreds of thousands of pounds fronting his show on the RT channel where he is ever willing to do his paymaster’s bidding.

The one thing all of these useful idiots are absolutely certain about is this – that the most obvious suspect – Vladimir Putin – the one holding the massive smoking gun – the one who swore revenge on all traitors and double agents and said that they would tracked down and killed – is innocent or at least ‘not proven to be guilty and thus not guilty’.

For years, the Russian state has had the West for fools. The country may have oligarchs bursting at the seams, but it has very little money and fairly weak actual military capability. It has instead managed to extend its power, muscle and influence through misinformation and highly effective propaganda. Like an old style Lada, AK47 or T-34 tank Russia has made a virtue of simplicity. Why spend billions of roubles on nuclear submarines when – for a fraction of the cost you can sow discontent, fear and division among your enemies. Russia Today – the glossy flagship of Kremlin deception – has created memes and tropes that dance at the edges of our political discourse and often tip into the mainstream. The myth that the EU caused mass unemployment in the South of Europe for example or the ‘no go zones’ in Londinistan or the idea that Sweden is overrun with murderous rampaging Muslim jihadis are all RT tropes. Now to be fair – they are very good at this – the true masters of fake news and there is a steady line of journalists, politicians (of all hues) and pundits willing to take the fee and feed the machine. But depressingly – there is a much wider contingent of gullible fools willing to lap it all up.

UK Porton Down facility

The Russian state has long targeted the EU in particular – because the EU poses a direct threat to her dimming power. Brexit worked in Putin’s favour. We know that Marine Le Pen’s anti-EU Front National received money directly from the Kremlin. It can hardly be a coincidence that so many at the centre of the Brexit storm have links or expressed admiration for Vlad – how deep those links go and to what extent they compromise the integrity of Farage and others has yet to be fully established but the whiff of cordite is in the air.

What is patently obvious and what the Skripal incident nimbly underlines, is that the loyalty of these self-professed ‘patriots’ to Great Britain plays second fiddle to their unwillingness to criticise Russia even when (apparently) the Kremlin is trying to murder citizens and snuff out any hapless passers-by on the streets of England. Some serious questions need to be asked about how long OFCOM will allow RT to broadcast its misinformation into UK homes but the bigger question is this – just how loyal are these fellow travelling Lord Haw Haws to the country they purport to love? And how long are the rest of us willing to let them get away with it?

The Brexit Hour – why Nigel Farage could be our Churchill.

The clock is ticking. The UK is scheduled to leave the EU on the 29^th March 2019 – in just one year’s time and it looks increasingly as if the British government hasn’t got its pencils out of the case yet, let alone written its name at the top of the exam sheet.

There’s confusion over the Irish border, a lack of clarity over EU citizens’ rights, the exit bill and that’s before we even get to the transition period. Nobody can agree on anything. Indeed, if Britain were ordering breakfast instead of trying to divorce itself from our biggest trading and diplomatic partner, we’d currently have nothing in front of us but an empty fruit bowl, a selection of unappetising condiments and an unseemly fight (possibly involving knives and swearing) going on in the kitchen.

What is to be done?

In 1940 as Britain teetered on the brink of evisceration by the Axis powers, Winston Churchill – viewed by many at the time as a preening has-been – was suddenly elevated to the top job and found himself leading a grand coalition, dedicated to working together to fight off the Nazi threat. Churchill’s USP was that he had been one of the few consistent voices warning against appeasement; so after the fall of France and a bit of a tussle with that chump Lord Halifax, he was handed the keys to Number 10 and told to get on with it. His approach was novel. He ate a lot of spotted dick, did some V signs at the door, smoked cigars, got hugged by Kristen Scott Thomas and took a ride on the tube which miraculously convinced everyone that the war was in the bag. Easy. Five years later, the conflict was over. Sure 60 odd million people had died, but we had won and that was the main thing and everybody lived happily ever after in thatched cottages until 1973 when the evil EEC started manoeuvres again.

If the EU referendum was the end of the phoney war then this is our 1940 – our Darkest Hour. The time has come for a new Churchill to step up to the mark. Sure, the nature of that threat is different this time and yes we have done it to ourselves – and OK chlorinated chicken will be here long before the Gestapo er …. EPP have set up shop in Buckingham Palace…… but clearly what is needed is a fresh government of all talents, led by the one man who has stood firm against the evil, blood-thirsty, car safety standards obsessed EU for three decades.

Winston Churchill relaxes at the cinema

But who is the new Winnie? Well obviously – it’s Nigel Farage. He has the suits, he smokes a lot and critically, while the misguided establishment parties have sought to appease the EU and try to find an equable solution to the Brexit Catch 22 – our man Nigel has stood firm and resolute and no doubt eaten a lot of spotted dick in the process (and please note, that that is not a reference to Donald Trump.)

You see according to Nigel, Leaving the EU is a cinch. As he told BBC Hardtalk in September 2016 it boils down to this:

“To me, Brexit is easy. We have back British passports, we have control of our fishing waters, and our companies are not subject to EU law through the single market.”

Simples. So while everyone else in the ‘legacy parties’ has been worrying about complex things like frictionless borders, tariff free trade and the rights of EU citizens this quiet, unassuming titan of a statesman has had the answers all along.

There are other obvious benefits. According to impeccable source ‘Nigel Farage’…… Nigel Farage is best friends with Donald Trump and that unfortunate looming US trade deal crisis can be wafted away like Rothmans smoke.

“AH! But Mr Farage is not an MP!” I hear you re-moan.  Well there’s absolutely nothing to stop someone making him a Lord and he can govern from the Upper Chamber like Lord Salisbury did. Into his grand coalition we could add all the other people who tell us that Brexit is easy. Regular LBC caller Barry in Staines, who is fond of telling presenters that “we just go on to WFT rules and it’s sorted” could be Chancellor. Apprentice winner Michelle Dewberry could be Foreign Secretary. Andy Pierce of the Daily Mail could be Home Secretary. Jacob Rees-Mogg could be Minister for wind up gramophones. And of course a place at the Cabinet table should still be reserved for Liam “Brexit deal will be the easiest thing in human history” Fox and David “simple and easy” Davies.

It’s clear that the people holding Britain back are the civil servants, Remoaners and appeasers like Mrs May and of course all those horrid judges and that nasty Gina Miller. So let’s get rid of them as well – at least until the deed is done. Send them on holiday to the Canaries or something. Let’s clear the decks and give Prime Minister Nigel Farage a clean slate for this ‘fish and passports’ vision of Britain. Let’s get behind it and go forward together to victory!!!!!!!!

And when in two weeks everything has gone to hell in a handcart we can collectively decide never to listen to his simplistic drivel again and conclude that populist solutions to complex problems – are rarely solutions at all.

Nigel Farage

Of course Nigel Farage wants a second referendum – without the EU he is nothing

So Nigel Farage has told Channel Five’s Matthew Wright that he is: “coming round to the idea of a second referendum.” Farage is a wily goat and he could simply be trying to whip up controversy to reignite his flagging media circus and grab the headlines. On the other hand, if he means it, we are obliged to draw one of two conclusions – either he genuinely thinks that a second referendum would be easily won and that the Remain cause would thus be put to bed for good – or – he’s doing what he always does – thinking about himself and gambling that either way he will win.

In the year and a half since the EU referendum the polls on Leave and Remain have barely budged but what has remained consistent since August 2017 (according to YouGov data) is a belief that the government are handling the negotiations badly with 57% of voters currently believing that things are not going well. May’s government remains unpopular and given that many treated the last EU referendum as a judgment on David Cameron, this would not bode well for the Brexiteers in a binary choice on whether to leave on the terms of the final deal – or remain.

Any second vote would be a high risk strategy and given that his side has ‘won’ a better stratagem might be for Farage to shut up and let us Remoaners shout at the darkness – so why isn’t he doing that?

Simple. Nigel would have nothing to lose from a second referendum. He is essentially a European politician. His career, his alliances and his standing all rest on the very beast that he has spent twenty years claiming he wants to slay. He has done very well out of it indeed. Estimates put his salary at a whopping £241,138 making him one of the best paid politicians in Britain – if not the whole of Europe. Now of course that salary is not made up entirely of his EU pay but crucially his media career is dependent upon his reputation as the figurehead of Brexit. Farage clearly believed that a Trump Whitehouse would lead to a glittering US media career but that has not materialised and after initial, if rather reticent, overtures from Trump the former UKIP leader seems to have been dropped like a hot kipper. The post Brexit future must loom empty and large.

A second referendum thus appeals. If he ‘loses’ he can go back to the old routine and keep that nice MEP package – if he ‘wins’ he can inject new life into his media profile and have another pop at the American gig.

In essence, Farage needs the EU every bit as much as George needed the dragon, as Tom needed Jerry or Syd Little his Eddie Large.

Remainers meanwhile should take succour from this. The battle-ground has shifted considerably since June 2016. The British public are far more aware of the consequences of leaving the EU than previously and the Brexiteer irregulars have depleted and dispersed. This time we would not be so complacent and this time – I believe – we would win.

According to Herodutus, the Persians made all complex decisions twice. At first they would get drunk out of their minds and vote and then – a few days later – when everyone had recovered sufficiently they would do it again sober. In June 2016 Britain held an insane and drunken referendum – let’s take Farage’s lead and do it again – clearheaded.