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| Version 2 | Version 3 |
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| Coming next, a Brexit divorce: the kind that involves the police | Coming next, a Brexit divorce: the kind that involves the police |
| (30 days later) | |
| Forget Gwyneth Paltrow’s idea of a conscious uncoupling. On the evidence so far, this will be anger, rancour and tears | Forget Gwyneth Paltrow’s idea of a conscious uncoupling. On the evidence so far, this will be anger, rancour and tears |
| Contact author | Contact author |
| Fri 8 Dec 2017 17.03 GMT | Fri 8 Dec 2017 17.03 GMT |
| Last modified on Wed 14 Feb 2018 15.29 GMT | |
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| To Brussels, where, according to football’s Michael Gove: “The final whistle has blown and the prime minister has won.” The manager’s safe for another week, then. Unfortunately, Arlene Foster has been brought in as director of football. | To Brussels, where, according to football’s Michael Gove: “The final whistle has blown and the prime minister has won.” The manager’s safe for another week, then. Unfortunately, Arlene Foster has been brought in as director of football. |
| Still, this is probably my favourite Gove reaction shot since he said of Theresa May’s coughed-out conference speech horror show: “I thought it was a fantastic conference speech from a prime minister at the top of her game.” | Still, this is probably my favourite Gove reaction shot since he said of Theresa May’s coughed-out conference speech horror show: “I thought it was a fantastic conference speech from a prime minister at the top of her game.” |
| Luckily, Gove doesn’t have a reputation for self-deluding treachery, or the prime minister would be watching her back right about now. Also paying May a compliment she couldn’t refuse was Boris Johnson, who on Friday morning congratulated her and looked forward to “remaining true to the referendum result – taking back control of our laws, money and borders for the whole of the UK”. Yup. There’s still everything to slay for. | Luckily, Gove doesn’t have a reputation for self-deluding treachery, or the prime minister would be watching her back right about now. Also paying May a compliment she couldn’t refuse was Boris Johnson, who on Friday morning congratulated her and looked forward to “remaining true to the referendum result – taking back control of our laws, money and borders for the whole of the UK”. Yup. There’s still everything to slay for. |
| I can’t help feeling Davis is just the territorial Dexeu secretary. He does do detail, but only every third weekend | I can’t help feeling Davis is just the territorial Dexeu secretary. He does do detail, but only every third weekend |
| The upshot, for now, seems to be that the magical thinking on the Irish border is going to be allowed to continue for a bit longer. Even so, the tone of the European commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, in his joint press conferences with May, is always akin to the one José Mourinho might adopt toward the manager of a League One side his reserves have just knocked out in the FA Cup fourth round. She’s a tough opponent, she doesn’t make it easy for them … | The upshot, for now, seems to be that the magical thinking on the Irish border is going to be allowed to continue for a bit longer. Even so, the tone of the European commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, in his joint press conferences with May, is always akin to the one José Mourinho might adopt toward the manager of a League One side his reserves have just knocked out in the FA Cup fourth round. She’s a tough opponent, she doesn’t make it easy for them … |
| Friday morning’s post-match interview was stagily gracious to someone who clearly hasn’t troubled the EU’s defences for so much as 30 seconds. For her part, May’s claim that the process “hasn’t been easy for either side” was confirmation that at any stage, it would have been perfectly safe for the keeper to have popped round the back of the net to have a fag and do a sudoku. | Friday morning’s post-match interview was stagily gracious to someone who clearly hasn’t troubled the EU’s defences for so much as 30 seconds. For her part, May’s claim that the process “hasn’t been easy for either side” was confirmation that at any stage, it would have been perfectly safe for the keeper to have popped round the back of the net to have a fag and do a sudoku. |
| Obviously, not everyone is pretending to be happy. Pantwetter-in-chief is Nigel Farage, Britain’s biggest comeback-seeker, who persists in seeing himself as a Terminator figure when he’s actually just Norma Desmond. Much as he must be enjoying graveyard appearances on Fox News and endorsing alleged paedophiles for Steve Bannon, Farage is comically desperate to be back in politics. “A deal in Brussels is good news for Mrs May,” he spat, “as we can now move on to the next phase of humiliation.” I love the idea that a man who conceded then unconceded defeat twice at his own referendum night party would have the nerve, let alone the brain, to do any better. | Obviously, not everyone is pretending to be happy. Pantwetter-in-chief is Nigel Farage, Britain’s biggest comeback-seeker, who persists in seeing himself as a Terminator figure when he’s actually just Norma Desmond. Much as he must be enjoying graveyard appearances on Fox News and endorsing alleged paedophiles for Steve Bannon, Farage is comically desperate to be back in politics. “A deal in Brussels is good news for Mrs May,” he spat, “as we can now move on to the next phase of humiliation.” I love the idea that a man who conceded then unconceded defeat twice at his own referendum night party would have the nerve, let alone the brain, to do any better. |
| Even so, Farage’s underlying point is instructive because it’s one becoming more widespread among hardline Brexiters. Namely: Brexit would be amazing except it’s being done wrong. Advocates of this view remind me of those people who think the primary problem with communism is just that it wasn’t done right by the Soviets. Over the years, I have spoken to various individuals who will tell you that Stalin obviously went too far – 25 million’s rather a lot, isn’t it? – but who fairly blithely concede that a certain number of deaths was inevitable; call it a round 10 (million). That these same people regard the Iraq war as the greater stain on the conscience of the left always seemed to me quite the curiosity, albeit one that should be examined only when wearing rubber gloves. | Even so, Farage’s underlying point is instructive because it’s one becoming more widespread among hardline Brexiters. Namely: Brexit would be amazing except it’s being done wrong. Advocates of this view remind me of those people who think the primary problem with communism is just that it wasn’t done right by the Soviets. Over the years, I have spoken to various individuals who will tell you that Stalin obviously went too far – 25 million’s rather a lot, isn’t it? – but who fairly blithely concede that a certain number of deaths was inevitable; call it a round 10 (million). That these same people regard the Iraq war as the greater stain on the conscience of the left always seemed to me quite the curiosity, albeit one that should be examined only when wearing rubber gloves. |
| There are already several variants of this afoot, as far as Brexit is concerned. There’s Farage, obviously. There’s the provisional wing of the leave campaign saying the problem with Brexit is that it’s being delivered by the establishment. There’s the Vote Leave director, Dominic Cummings, saying it would have been great if only we had entirely rebooted the civil service. | There are already several variants of this afoot, as far as Brexit is concerned. There’s Farage, obviously. There’s the provisional wing of the leave campaign saying the problem with Brexit is that it’s being delivered by the establishment. There’s the Vote Leave director, Dominic Cummings, saying it would have been great if only we had entirely rebooted the civil service. |
| There’s something rather Stalinist about Brexit’s wreakers of so-called creative destruction. In his Memoirs of a Revolutionary, Victor Serge quotes the Romanian writer Panait Istrati, visiting the 1930s USSR of purges and show trials. “All right, I can see the broken eggs,” he said. “Where is this omelette of yours?” | There’s something rather Stalinist about Brexit’s wreakers of so-called creative destruction. In his Memoirs of a Revolutionary, Victor Serge quotes the Romanian writer Panait Istrati, visiting the 1930s USSR of purges and show trials. “All right, I can see the broken eggs,” he said. “Where is this omelette of yours?” |
| Maybe the omelette’s coming with phase two of the talks, on to which we now move. If you’ve spent the past eight months thinking “what this shitshow needs is to hear more from Liam Fox”, then this is the phase for you. The trade secretary is a former GP who still uses his title 25 years after the fact – unlike various irrelevances such as retired rear admirals and so on, whose professional achievements presumably amount to rather less than writing antibiotic prescriptions in Beaconsfield in the 1980s. Anyway, that guy is pretty sure that striking a deal with the EU will be “the easiest in human history”. | Maybe the omelette’s coming with phase two of the talks, on to which we now move. If you’ve spent the past eight months thinking “what this shitshow needs is to hear more from Liam Fox”, then this is the phase for you. The trade secretary is a former GP who still uses his title 25 years after the fact – unlike various irrelevances such as retired rear admirals and so on, whose professional achievements presumably amount to rather less than writing antibiotic prescriptions in Beaconsfield in the 1980s. Anyway, that guy is pretty sure that striking a deal with the EU will be “the easiest in human history”. |
| Happily, hearing more from Fox doesn’t mean we will be hearing less from David Davis, whose antics over his Brexit impact assessments are most kindly summarised as Bring Your Anxiety Dream to Work Week. Simon Hoggart used to have a great line about Davis having been in the territorial SAS – “strangling the Queen’s enemies with piano wire, but only at weekends”. After this week’s semi-detached performance, I can’t help feeling Davis is just the territorial Dexeu secretary: he does do detail, but only every third weekend. | Happily, hearing more from Fox doesn’t mean we will be hearing less from David Davis, whose antics over his Brexit impact assessments are most kindly summarised as Bring Your Anxiety Dream to Work Week. Simon Hoggart used to have a great line about Davis having been in the territorial SAS – “strangling the Queen’s enemies with piano wire, but only at weekends”. After this week’s semi-detached performance, I can’t help feeling Davis is just the territorial Dexeu secretary: he does do detail, but only every third weekend. |
| As for his phoned-in impact assessments, MPs and peers are now allowed to read the documents, though they have to do it with an official chaperone. The entire shtick recalls the moment on Scientology’s pathway when believers are finally let into the innermost secrets of Hubbard’s religion. It was always estimated to cost at least $360,000 to reach this point, so we can only imagine the sense of serious WTF-ery that stole over the average Operating Thetan as they started reading about Xenu, the intergalactic tyrant who sent his forces to Earth 75m years ago in craft that, strangely, looked exactly like DC8s. The Scientologists used to reveal this information on a ship far out to sea, presumably so that by the time they dropped you dejectedly back on shore, you’d had time to stop screaming about being completely had. | As for his phoned-in impact assessments, MPs and peers are now allowed to read the documents, though they have to do it with an official chaperone. The entire shtick recalls the moment on Scientology’s pathway when believers are finally let into the innermost secrets of Hubbard’s religion. It was always estimated to cost at least $360,000 to reach this point, so we can only imagine the sense of serious WTF-ery that stole over the average Operating Thetan as they started reading about Xenu, the intergalactic tyrant who sent his forces to Earth 75m years ago in craft that, strangely, looked exactly like DC8s. The Scientologists used to reveal this information on a ship far out to sea, presumably so that by the time they dropped you dejectedly back on shore, you’d had time to stop screaming about being completely had. |
| For now, Britain feels equally adrift. And phase one was supposed to be the easy bit. As European council president Donald Tusk said: “Breaking up is hard. Building a new relationship is harder.” How successfully will the UK consciously uncouple from the EU? Well, without wishing to introduce a note of caution on such a triumphant day, there is a nagging sense that Britain is going to fall short of the Gwyneth Paltrow model. Perhaps the UK will transition to taking the divorce well. But on the basis of the past eight months, it will instead transition to a lengthy period of driving round to its ex’s house at night, sitting in the car outside with a bottle of vodka, and texting a cocktail of pure venom and pleas to get back together, until the police are called. | For now, Britain feels equally adrift. And phase one was supposed to be the easy bit. As European council president Donald Tusk said: “Breaking up is hard. Building a new relationship is harder.” How successfully will the UK consciously uncouple from the EU? Well, without wishing to introduce a note of caution on such a triumphant day, there is a nagging sense that Britain is going to fall short of the Gwyneth Paltrow model. Perhaps the UK will transition to taking the divorce well. But on the basis of the past eight months, it will instead transition to a lengthy period of driving round to its ex’s house at night, sitting in the car outside with a bottle of vodka, and texting a cocktail of pure venom and pleas to get back together, until the police are called. |
| • Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist | • Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist |
| Brexit | Brexit |
| Opinion | Opinion |
| Liam Fox | Liam Fox |
| Michael Gove | Michael Gove |
| David Davies | David Davies |
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