Brexit’s last best chance

It’s been even more humiliating second time round. The United Kingdom has again been reduced to asking the European Union for an extension to the Article 50 process. Once was bad enough but twice marks a profound failure of government and Parliament. It has left the EU deciding the country’s future.

In Westminster, there is no sign of a resolution to the Brexit impasse. Cross-party talks between Labour and the Tories continue. Sources close to those talks feel that a common position is unlikely to be found. A deal between the two parties would require that Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn both be prepared to split their parties. This seems unlikely.

When May met with the executive of the 1922 committee of Tory backbenchers on Monday, she went out of her way to reassure them that she knew how difficult a customs union would be for the party and stressed that she was looking at a customs arrangement instead.