Political column – March 14

Now come on, really, this is beyond a joke. But I do recommend that you laugh, as otherwise you'll cry.

There is though a logical way forward – forward is only a relative term in the circumstances and could also be interpreted as backwards, sideways, or standing still.

And that is what I shall call the Guy Fawkes option, which is to call a general election, to get rid of the current bunch of useless MPs.

As they have proven unwilling or incapable of running the country and making decisions, giving the public the chance to vote for a new crop of MPs would be a positive step.

Even the MPs have the awareness to realise that everybody is totally fed up with the whole Brexit business.

Parliament wants to take back control of the process, which means that Theresa May will be ordered to go back to Brussels to seek a deal, any deal.

This week's meaningful vote will, then, be followed by a meaningless proposition, as unless MPs can come to a collective agreed view on the shape of the deal they want, poor Mrs May, if she survives the coming weeks – and as regards the basic issues it is irrelevant if she does or not – will have no idea what she is supposed to be negotiating for.

In my battered and well-thumbed dictionary, a deal is defined as a bargain, transaction, or agreement.

So if the instruction to Mrs May is as vague as reaching a deal, as opposed to not having a deal, it could in theory be satisfied by any agreement on which she and the EU could shake hands.

"Michel, I think we'll leave the EU and trade on World Trade Organisation terms."

"No problem Theresa, that's a deal. Let's shake on it."

Obviously that's not what the MPs have in mind.

Let's pretend that MPs do agree on something, for instance the so-called "Norway option."

That raises the prospect of the Prime Minister being sent to seek a deal which she may strongly personally disagree with – a ludicrous negotiating position.

She would have to resign. But it would still be a ludicrous way of negotiating whoever is in Number 10.

So what "deal" would command majority support across the House of Commons? That's an awkward one. Look into MPs' hearts, and it's Remain.

Yet they voted overwhelmingly in favour of the referendum in the first place, and voted overwhelmingly in favour of triggering Article 50 setting a date for the UK's departure from the EU.

If they could keep the UK in the EU without the public noticing, a lot of their troubles would be solved.

Cross-party consensus? There isn't going to be any. Labour's plan has already been defeated in a Commons vote. Ian Blackford, the Westminster leader of the Scottish Myopics, will not support any form of Brexit whatsoever.

The deal put to the Commons this week has been portrayed as Mrs May's deal, but we should remember that it was also the EU's deal, the deal of Macron, Merkel, and so on.

Two years in the making, it has now been consigned to the dustbin of history, with literally nothing lined up to replace it.

An extension to Article 50, assuming the EU agrees to one and does not summarily kick us out, is being billed as a chance for the Commons to sort itself out.

Yeah, right.

An opportunity for MPs to go round in pointless circles more like.

The current House of Commons is not fit for purpose. Public confidence is collapsing.

MPs are in last chance saloon. If in the coming few weeks they continue to let us down, there will be nothing to lose by calling a general election except the worst crop of MPs in history.

Then Brenda will be sought out on the streets of Bristol so she can say: "Not another one!", a sentiment which would resonate as much now as it did then.

Can't be helped. Because when a pantomime has become a horror show, it is time to change the cast.