Why the Dame faces defeat in the Christmas panto

Was it Brexit that turned us collectively insane? Or was the EU referendum a sign that we had already lost our marbles? Whether the chicken laid the egg or the egg gave rise to the chicken, perhaps we’ll never know. In just two weeks, however, Parliament looks set to act in an utterly reckless and crazy way by voting down Theresa May’s proposed withdrawal agreement. After which, we’ll all be running around the farmyard without our heads and the country will be in the biggest clucking mess since World War II.

But let’s get one thing straight early on. It’s not actually Theresa May’s deal at all. To describe it that way is entirely misleading. This is the deal that the EU is prepared to offer us. Sure, they might tinker with some of the detail at the margins. But we’re not going to get something fundamentally better than this. That’s because of the power relationships involved.

Remember how the crackpot Brexiters promised us that the German car manufacturers would be strapping Merkel to the bonnet of a BMW and driving her down the Autobahn at 90mph until she conceded everything we wanted? That worked out well.

Recall the swagger and misplaced couldn’t-be-arsed complacency of David Davis? How stupid Jean-Claude Juncker and Donald Tusk and Michel Barnier have made us all look now.

When you listen to Theresa Villiers or the bumptious Michael Fallon demand that Theresa May ‘changes’ the deal this way or that way – or you hear Jeremy Corbyn argue that he and the hard-left relics running the Labour Party could do better in the negotiations – it’s important to remember two things. The first is that the EU27 call all the shots. The second is that there isn’t going to be any fundamental renegotiation. Just window dressing at most.

Imagine I’ve walked into a Maserati showroom. (This takes some imagination on my part too, it has to be said.) I try my best to negotiate a discount or, at the very least, get some extras thrown in. Strangely, no dice from the salesman. I am shown the door with a look of bewildered pity. The price is the price, sir.

I get back home and tell my wife.

She says I’m a blithering idiot who couldn’t negotiate my way out of a paper bag. If only she had been there. Get yourself back down to the showroom, she says, or let her conduct the negotiations instead.

The delusional psychology in the Commons over the Brexit deal is absolutely off the scale.

I sense MPs are far more vehement in their opposition to the deal than people in the country at large. Sure, polls do show that most people don’t like the deal. Why? Because they are either Leavers or Remainers and with the current offer from the EU, it’s hard to see either side really getting its way. The agreement is a compromise. Polls also show, however, that May is right in asserting that public is keen to get on with everything now and move forward.

It looks as if the Prime Minister could be crushed arithmetically in a fortnight’s time. Half her own party are against her, most of Labour, as well as the DUP and the smaller parties.

The Brexiters think that voting down the deal will lead to a Canada+++ arrangement. The Corbynistas did hope it would lead to a general election and a socialist government. Now, ITV's Robert Peston is being briefed that Jez might quickly move to a so-called 'people's vote' in the wake of  a Commons defeat for May.  This is music to the ears of the full-on Remoaner faction, which encompasses more moderate Tories such as Justine Greening and pro-European Labour MPs such as David Lammy.

So perhaps a second referendum is now a more likely outcome? A chance for the poor misguided electorate to demonstrate how it has seen the light. But don't assume that anything about that referendum will be easy. What are the questions? How is it financed? When is it held?

The escape hatch may turn out to be some kind of dark labyrinth that no one can navigate their way around. And Corbyn would be in the ludicrous position of being unable to recommend staying in the EU, but simultaneously unable to recommend the deal that had just been rejected.

So the outcome of any Parliamentary defeat for May on 11^th December is completely unpredictable.

Everyone talks with a smug confidence, as if their own formula simply must be the one that prevails.  

The reality will be chaos.

I am not remotely surprised at the games being played by Jacob Rees-Mogg, Arlene Foster and Jeremy Corbyn for their own political purposes. It is shocking, however, to see so many mainstream Labour MPs – who share no love of the Labour leadership – looking to vote down the deal. The Yvette Coopers and Chuka Umunnas and Tom Watsons should know better.

The EU’s deal is imperfect and it raises a lot of complex and uncomfortable issues. But it is concrete. It is tangible. It exists in the real world.

In a Christmas pantomime on 11^th December, parliamentarians look set to vote against a solid proposal in favour of wispy genie emerging from a lamp. And everyone has their own wish list.

Utter madness, completely befitting the end of 2018. Wave bye bye to any last semblance of stability, boys and girls.