All we want for Christmas BREXIT

(But don’t hold your breath)

FLExTENSION. Sounds like one of those fancy attachments you get with a vacuum cleaner, designed to dig the dirt out of hard- to- reach nooks and crannies.

What it actually means is yet another delay to Britain’s departure from the EU. Brussels has graciously consented to give us until January 31, 2020, to get our act together and either hold an election, pass the withdrawal agreement or call the whole thing off.

The only certainty is that we won’t be leaving on Thursday, meaning Boris Johnson’s ‘die in a ditch’ deadline has been missed.

Not that Boris can be blamed for failing to hit his target. Since becoming Prime Minister, he has moved heaven and earth to cobble together an imperfect deal which at least serves to break the deadlock.

No, the delay i s down to the obstructionist Remainer rabble in Parliament, who have spent the past three-and-a-half years conspiring to renege on their promise to honour the 2016 referendum result.

You don’t need me to recount yet again the concerted campaign to sabotage Brexit by any and every means possible.

Even after Boris managed to command a majority in the House f or his deal, MPs i mmediately prevented him f r om pushing it through in time to meet his October 31 deadline. Their excuse was that they needed longer to scrutinise the small print. Their real reason, as it has been all along, was to stop Brexit altogether.

Labour’s behaviour has been abominable. Corbyn keeps insisting he wants merely to take No Deal off the table, yet won’t vote for any deal Boris negotiates. Risibly, Corbyn claimed at the weekend that Boris still has No Deal ‘in his mind’.

And despite demanding an election almost daily for the past three years, Labour have refused up until now to let the Government call one.

That’s because they fear they’re heading for inevitable defeat.

Last ni g ht , Labour MPs abstained on a Government motion to hold an election in December. Under the ludicrous Fixed-term Parliaments Act, that meant Boris couldn’t get the twothirds majority he needs to dissolve Parliament.

BUT it does now look as if there will be an election before Christmas, after a change of heart by the Lib Dems and the Scots Nats, who have agreed to a one-line Bill which would require only a simple majority.

The date has still to be decided. Boris wants i t on Thursday, December 12. The Lib Dems and the SNP want it held on December 9, because that would deny Boris the time to get his Brexit deal through the Commons before going to the country.

Yes, I know. You wouldn’t think three days would make much difference — not after 40 months of wrangling. Yet this is precisely the kind of procedural nit-picking we have come to expect from this rotten Parliament.

Both the smaller Opposition parties have their own selfish reasons for agreeing to an election. They think it is now their best hope of s cuppering Brexit altogether. The SNP want to get the election out of the way before their former leader Alex Salmond’s trial on attempted rape and sexual assault charges in January. They also believe a new Parliament might approve second referendums on both Brexit and Scottish independence. The heart sinks. While we desperately need an election to end the paralysis of the past few months, I can’t say I’m looking forward to it with much relish. The moment the election is called, the politicians will go straight into campaigning mode.

There’ll be no escape. They’ll be in our faces 24/7.

Frankly, I’m sick of the sight and sound of politics and politicians. For the past nine years or so we’ve had nothing but.

Soon after the 2010 election, which ushered in the Coalition, we were treated to an expensive referendum on the voting system, which hardly anyone apart from Nick Clegg wanted.

Since then, we’ve had a Scottish independence referendum, the 2014 Euros, the 2016 Brexit referendum and General Elections in 2015 and 2017 — the latter called in a fit of hubris by Theresa May—plus this summer’s Euro elections, which we shouldn’t have had to contest because we were supposed to leave the EU in March.

Now we’re headed for another General Election and, if that goes pear-shaped for the Tories, second referendums on both Brexit and Scottish independence.

It’s not as if the result of most of these votes changed anything much. The politicians simply ignored results they didn’t like.

Clegg, currently coining it in Silicon Valley, broke his promise to cut the size of the Commons because the Alternative Vote referendum went decisively against him.

Scots were told they had a ‘once in a lifetime’ chance to vote for independence. When the people voted ‘ No’, the SNP pretended they had won and started campaigning immediately for a rerun.

At least Call Me Dave kept his pledge to hold a ‘ once in a generation’ EU referendum after winning the 2015 election.

But although Cameron promised solemnly to honour the result of that referendum, he resigned the day after Leave won and, threeand-a-half years on, MPs are still refusing to take Britain out of the EU. This is despite 80 per cent of them standing in 2017 on a manifesto commitment to implement Brexit.

WE WERE forced to take part in this summer’ s EU elections, because Westminster MPs had f ailed to get us out.

But even though the Brexit Party swept the board, the result did nothing to dampen the Remain resistance in the Commons.

So forgive me for wondering whether a fresh election will actually break the Brexit impasse. Anything can happen during the course of a five-week campaign.

Even if Boris wins a majority, plenty of hardline Remainers will get re-elected, determined to stop Brexit at any cost, in concert with the overwhelmingly pro-EU Lords and extra-parliamentary actors like Gina Miller.

Who would bet against another attempt to halt Leave ending up before the Supreme Court?

Meanwhile, we face the depressing prospect of selfiesnapping politicians peddling their lies and monopolising the air waves in the run-up to Christmas, competing with carol singers on our doorsteps.

And at the end of it, whatever the result, what guarantee is there that the politicians will take any notice of what the people want?

If the evidence of the past decade is anything to go by, none at all. Once back in their Bubble, it will be business as usual.

Not for the first time, I find myself agreeing with Ken Livingstone: