Theresa May has delivered an Idiots’ Brexit, but the idiots will not stand for it

The prime minister’s ‘political declaration’ contains vague concessions to go on searching for the impossible, but her party wants the impossible now

Around two decades ago, a contestant on Ready Steady Cook who fancied himself something of a comedy legend overturned his plastic bag to reveal the ingredients he had brought with him from home, from which he expected his mystery celebrity chef to whip up a gourmet feast inside 20 minutes. They were: a Pot Noodle, a Mars Bar and a can of lager.

Twenty minutes later, all of which this young man had spent grinning to himself at his anarchic powers of

daytime TV format subversion, Antony Worrall Thompson presented him the following meal: a Mars Bar, lightly fried in a lager batter, and, decanted into a nice white china bowl, a Pot Noodle.

It was at this point that the chap had the temerity to question Worrall Thompson’s powers of invention. He may even have muttered the words: “I could have done that myself.”

Was he really that stupid or was he just taking the piss? Alas, the credits rolled before these questions could be meaningfully explored. And suddenly, 20 short years later, Theresa May has returned from Brussels with her “Political Declaration setting out the Framework for the Future Relationship between the European Union and the United Kingdom”, and the same is being asked of a very large proportion of pro-Brexit Tory MPs.

As a gentle reminder, it is the UK, not the EU, that has turned up to these negotiations with the Pot Noodle/Mars Bar/lager triptych of demands that involve leaving the single market, leaving the customs union, but, by some process of dark magic, to do so in a way that does not require any kind of customs checks on the border in Ireland, where the EU will end and the UK will begin.

For 18 long months, the EU could not have been clearer about the limited range of culinary solutions these base ingredients offer. For 18 long months, here on the UK side, chocolate and dehydrated noodle related alchemy has been demanded.

And now that the Mars Bar has been gently fried in lager in a brave attempt to disguise the fundamentally obvious, the grinning idiots will not eat it. And more to the point, they think that if they’d just be given the pots and pans themselves, the Michelin stars would surely follow.

It was like watching a four-year-old trying to con another four-year-old into going to bed. Like a mouse asking if the trap could be withdrawn now that he has agreed to eat the cheese.

And best of all, as Theresa May faced down two hours of questions on it in the House of Commons, it slowly became clear that the late night last-minute negotiations that had brought us to this point had been done entirely to placate the very idiots who would now, alas, not be placated.

For those who still want, say, frictionless trade with the European Union, no hard border in Ireland and the ability to strike free trade deals, words had been included to intimate a “commitment to explore” the eminently impossible.

Earlier in the week, for example, Iain Duncan Smith had been in to see the prime minister to say that the Irish backstop was not needed, because technological solutions that are yet to be invented could do the job instead.

Now, with the desperate need to get this document published or else the weekend summit in Brussels be cancelled, it does indeed say the UK and the EU will consider “facilitative arrangements and technologies” and will look at developing “alternative arrangements” for an invisible border that is currently impossible.

As a result, Mr Duncan Smith wanted to know why, now that a vague commitment to explore his magical solutions was there in black and white, the backstop could not be withdrawn.

In other words, now that I have swallowed this magical flying pill, prime minister, I ask that my parachute be withdrawn.

It was like watching a four-year-old trying to con another four-year-old into going to bed. Like a mouse asking if the trap could be withdrawn now that he has agreed to eat the cheese.

Even Jeremy Corbyn had spotted that the document was “peppered with phrases like ‘look at’ and ‘will explore’.” And if Jeremy Corbyn has seen through your ruse, that’s when you know you really do have a problem.

The main point, though, is that after two hours, I believe a total of two MPs from all parties had spoken out in favour of Theresa May’s deal.

Brexit, like Ready Steady Cook, must end in a meaningful vote. You will not be shocked to learn that, back then, and despite Worrall Thompson’s very best efforts, the audience did not vote Pot Noodle.

When the House of Commons inevitably declines to do the same, more alchemy will be required; and as of now, nobody has even the tiniest clue what.