Brexit is likely to exacerbate this tendency. We were promised that in leaving the EU we would regain our sovereignty. But in abandoning an association based on equal standing, we expose ourselves to coercion by other nations. Our relationship with the US, especially under the stewardship of the trade secretary Liam Fox, is likely to look like that of servant and master.

Fox, preposterously, is now the only official member of the UK’s board of trade. The new trade bill would grant him Henry VIII powers, enabling him to create laws without parliamentary approval. It was published 24 hours after the consultation on the bill ended, which suggests it was written before people’s views had been taken into account. He will, in effect, be given a licence to do whatever he wants.