Why the Brexit hamper of wrong sticks in my throat

The Brexit hamper is perfect in its bizarre, bizarre flaws. Witness this thing. A delegation of leading Leavers presented a collection of British products to EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier, and it reveals much about the type of person pushing to leave the common market. It’s a physical manifestation of Brexiters’ fantasies about Britishness. Put simply, it’s nonsense.

I’ll accept some items in the hamper as excellent examples of the British identity, like the marmalade. Everybody deserves nice marmalade of a morning. It’s delicious… and made from Spanish oranges.

I’m also in favour of a jar of Piccalilli. Like haggis, it can be enjoyed without knowledge of its contents, which are mostly from India but never mind.

I’ll even accept Marmite as quintessentially British in a positive way, although I confess I’ve never got around to trying it; and adding a bottle of gin to the gift collection seems like a pleasant idea to me.

But many of the hamper’s items are stupid. There is a tone-deaf political statement inherent in including a biography of Winston Churchill, undoubtedly the right leader at the right time but perhaps a little too fond of war, killing and, er, let’s say his identity as a white Christian.

Another gift in there was William Shakespeare’s Complete Works, which indeed is a masterpiece. However, I’d point out that other books have been written since the Bard died 402 years ago – before Great Britain existed. As for the hamper’s bottle of English wine, the less said, the better.

This is the real problem: it’s all terribly English. Where’s the scotch whisky, or salmon, or anything from Wales or Northern Ireland?

Englishness, as all Scots know, is not Britishness. I’m fine with having a British identity but I’d like to share some concept of what it is with other people who claim to have it.

There’s the essence of the Brexit movement. It’s a desire to reclaim, whatever the cost, an identity that does not exist, and never has existed.

Stop it, you fools.

As for the hamper’s bottle of English wine, the less said, the better