She's The Real Deal

Of course Theresa May has alienated the people whose votes she will need next week. But she has played a blinder by casting the "People versus Parliament" split as a split between her deal and the several stripes of opposition to it. She has sold her deal as The Will of The People. That is very, very clever.

The present House of Commons was elected a year after the referendum, at the instigation of a Remain Prime Minister who knew that it would be as overwhelmingly Remain as the last one, since it would be made up mostly of the same people, if only because the Election had been called out of the blue. That is very, very clever.

She also foresaw that from about a year and a half after the referendum, all polling would show Remain ahead by about eight points, twice the margin of victory for Leave. That is very, very clever.

She realised that any deal negotiated by her would be, from the Leavers' point of view, the only thing worse than staying in the EU, so that either Remain would win a referendum against it, or a few years of life under it would see Britain begging to be let back into the EU. That is very, very clever.

And she understood that by running down the clock until, as is now genuinely possible, a Commons vote on her deal were to be held mere hours before the United Kingdom had been due to leave the European Union, then that deal would "just have to be" approved eventually. That is very, very clever, too.

Another hung Parliament is coming, however, and we need our people to hold the balance of power in it. It has become a local commonplace that I am on 30-30-30 with Labour and the Conservatives here at North West Durham, so that any one of us could be the First Past the Post. I will stand for this seat, if I can raise the £10,000 necessary to mount a serious campaign. Please email davidaslindsay@hotmail.com. Very many thanks.