Saturday column – May 11

After a gestation of many weeks, we are treated to the second most anticipated birth of the year.

Yes, the cross-party talks have borne fruit.

As, at the time at writing, and probably for all time the way things are looking, they demonstrably have not, we have to enter the realms of imagination and speculation to appreciate the significance of this national event.

The news comes in a communique from the heart of Downing Street.

"This is a beautiful baby which delivers for the British people on the referendum result," it reads.

The trouble is that, apart from Theresa May, nobody else thinks it's a beautiful baby.

On the contrary, they think it's an ugly thing – a monster, even – and are lining up to give the parents a slap.

As for the name, well, it's obvious. First name Brex, surname It. Oh, please yourselves.

Baby Brex does not have a good start in life. This is not a child who has been the product of love and trust, but is a product of dislike and mutual mistrust, with a mix of Conservative and Labour genes, which is the equivalent of making a baby by committee.

And then they ask the feared question. Who is the parent of this child?

It's not an issue for Theresa May. Brex is her last chance of standing down as Prime Minister with a legacy, an agreement which achieves the impossible and gets the nod from the Commons.

But on the Labour side, the response to the same question is lots of looking down and shuffling of feet. They have been keen to be seen to be prepared to hold talks aimed at finding common ground, and have ended up with their worst nightmare – finding common ground.

Nobody wants to own that. There must be a way out. What Labour wants is a "bad Tory Brexit" which they can oppose, and which would give continued licence to call for a general election or second referendum.

The last thing they want is to be holding the baby and sharing the responsibility for it.

Worst of all, if Labour did reach agreement with the Tories on a Brexit way forward, then they would have the tricky issue of deciding which way to vote on that agreement.

Sir Keir Starmer believes that remaining in the EU offers the best future for Britain, and has said in the past that he would vote Remain again. I appear to be the only person in the entire country to think that for him to be shadow Brexit secretary is something only a Monty Python scriptwriter would dream up.

So, if Sir Keir's fingerprints were all over a cross-party deal with the Tories to secure Brexit, would he actually vote for it? Or would he vote against the deal he had himself agreed?

My guess is that he would say "leave it to the people."

It is all academic, as we know the baby Brex, if and when it materialises, would have a miserable and perhaps short existence, unloved on all sides, and the cause of much disharmony.

There is a strand of thinking that if the Tories and Labour had got together at the very start of the process, all the troubles which have flowed since could have been avoided.

I don't see it though. Labour's steadfast strategy has been to try to force a general election, and you don't do that by getting into bed with the government.

For the moment, the best party political policy for both the Tories and Labour seems to be to keep the talks going and make it look like it's the intransigence or bad faith from the other side which is the cause of the ultimate breakdown.

Theresa May told the Commons this week that the clear message from the public in the local election results was "that they want us to get on and deliver Brexit."

Actually, the vast majority didn't vote at all. So nobody can say for certain what the message was.

Politicians will only come to know what the silent majority think when they choose not to be silent.

.........

Gavin Williamson swore "on his children's lives" that he was not responsible for that leak.

In doing so he has raised the bar in the political denial states. Swearing on your children's lives has more emotional impact than swearing on the life of your pet dog, and fewer domestic complications than swearing on the life of your partner.

But were Mr Williamson's two daughters party to the decision? It may be that Mr Williamson sat down with them, explained he was in a bit of bother at the office, and was going to offer them up as human sacrifices.

If they agreed to this arrangement, I'm going to guess that they didn't know what they were voting for and are now better informed.

I suspect if he asked them again, they would reply: "We love you dearly daddy – but why don't you swear on your own life?"

...............

Hurrah for Nicholas Witchell, who has struck a blow for old-fashioned news reporting.

Plonked randomly outside Buckingham Palace, and invited to give the latest about Harry and Meghan's baby, the BBC royal correspondent, with his hard news background, confirmed that there had indeed been a baby, and that there was as yet no name.

Having run out of things to say, he then handed back to the studio, without even speculating on the levels of happiness of the proud parents.

Concise, to the point, and no less informative than those stream-of-consciousness commentators who tell us nothing, but at much greater length.

Trying to get a veteran old-school newsman to fill airtime when there's nothing happening is a bit like trying to run a car without fuel.