The rich history of these islands includes a Blessed Parliament, a Good Parliament and a Loyal Parliament. Also a Merciless Parliament, a Rump Parliament and a Barebone’s Parliament. The current one could go down as the Addled Parliament or the Useless Parliament if those nicknames had not already been awarded in earlier times. So let us call this the Broken Parliament.

It has been bust by Brexit. During the referendum three long and painful years ago, it was the Leavers’ boast that they would restore parliamentary sovereignty to all the powers and glories they claimed had been lost to Brussels. What they have instead done is to turn Britain’s legislature into a theatre of anarchy that daily demonstrates that it cannot agree on anything. A country once widely admired for the functioning of its democracy and the robustness of its institutions has been turned into a global joke.

-----------------

That could require the EU to agree to an emergency summit at which its leaders would be asked to give her time to try. Here we must register the ingloriously ironic consequence of all these Westminster games, especially those played by the ultras. Their astonishing achievement has been to make the EU more powerful in our national affairs than it has ever been. A delay to Brexit is entirely in the EU’s gift and requires, as I noted last week, the unanimous consent of every one of its members. Each state, large or small, can say no or demand something in return for a yes. It is a fairly safe assumption that the EU will grant a British request for an extension because its leaders don’t want a calamity crash-out Brexit. But the EU gets to dictate not only whether a supplicant Britain is granted a postponement but for how long and on what terms and conditions.

This, apparently, is taking back control. Perhaps we should call it the Cursed Parliament.