Oh what a farce? Government ministers fall like a deck of cards.

Oh what a farce? Government ministers fall like a deck of cards.

You could hardly make this one up. We have now entered the realms of farce, parody and music hall comedy, a throwback to the days when Victorian circus acts would parade around the ring as horses and elephants pranced around with wild abandon. Then for those who were interested there was the fairground outside where an entranced public would look at strange, distorted faces of themselves  while staring at huge mirrors. Then there were strongmen flexing their muscles, the clowns with their amusing red noses, the fire eaters, the jugglers and then the incredible plate spinners. For the good, old fashioned circus read the English Government.

Oh yes. Ladies and Gentlemen it's time to present the British Government, a fine, upstanding body of men and women who have now fallen into the darkest pit of humiliation. It somehow beggars description. How on earth have we come to this? What on earth have we done wrong? This has to be some kind of sweet revenge for some pathetic indiscretion, some wounding retribution for something that we must have done but can barely remember.

Yesterday the entire British Cabinet ganged up on Prime Minister Theresa May and bullied her quite mercilessly, called her names, poked their malicious tongues at her and threatened to tell their teacher for something they may or may not have said. Then the nation watched aghast as the headmaster or headmistress pulled out the slipper and cane before reprimanding them. Ouch, that really did hurt Theresa? How could you do that and yet they did? She went back on her word and that's something that couldn't be tolerated.

One by one they came and went, falling on their swords, quitting and resigning, generally playing up like spoilt kids creating havoc on a school trip to the Science Museum. They dug out their catapults, released their childish stink bombs  and flung paper aeroplanes at the teacher behind their back, noisy and unfeasibly disruptive children who were just asking for suspension. They shout and scream in the most shameful act of rebellion, jumping onto desks, slamming their desks for attention and then just making a terrible racket.

They followed each other in fairly quick succession. There were the junior ministers Suella Braverman and Shailesh Vara who were then joined by Work and Pensions secretary Esther Mcvey and, more importantly, the Brexit secretary Dominic Raab who must have thought this was some kind of cheap joke, a left over Tommy Cooper piece of magic and silliness that had gone terribly wrong. But it happened and one week in the middle of November begins to feel like the coldest and darkest day at the start of January. British politics seemed to hit rock bottom, the lowest common denominator, a foul stain on a tempestuous political landscape.

This is the morning after the night before and some of us are just emotionally exhausted by the fall out from the draft agreement for Brexit, a term now so annoyingly repetitive that we may have to refrain from using the worst of all Anglo Saxon expletives. When next we listen to our radios or cast a critical TV eye we may have to exercise self restraint. Sometimes you just wish you could lock them all away in some dark, empty room, send them to bed without any supper and tell them not to come out until they behave with some semblance of propriety, just a hint of politeness.

So let me give you another rundown on the latest list of rebels, mavericks, non conformists, turncoats, back stabbers, poison pen letter writers and ya boo sucks merchants. They stalk the back alleyways, creep along dimly lit streets, shifty and resentful, bitter and twisted figures. They wallow blithely in each other's misfortune and then put in an afternoon shift at the House of Commons.  Some hunt in packs while others prefer their own company, always scheming and suspicious. Then they pounce on their unwitting victim before tearing them to shreds. It was ever thus in the House of Commons or should that be the House of Commoners.

Against this sinister backdrop of dark plots and Machiavellian, mischievous machinations there lie those skulking, slouching and shambling politicians with their thick coats and trilby hats tightly perched on their head. They light their cigarettes, a purple and blue puff of smoke drifting through the misty night air, cupping their hands for warmth. All hell has broken loose in the late night lobbies at the House of Commons.

Outside Westminster, the streets have emptied and the eerie silence is broken by a Route Master bus or  rumbling cars that flash and then blink their headlights. It was widely assumed that the boys and girls who constitute the English parliament had made up their minds. Sadly, we were all mistaken because Brexit is still a work in progress and it looks as if things will remain in a state of complete confusion for ever more. We may have to put our lives on hold for as long as it takes Boris Johnson to brush those golden blond locks of hair.

Now there's a man who must be revelling in all this monstrous running commentary of accusation and counter accusation, pathetic posturing, piffling platitudes and absurd name calling. Boris Johnson, to all outward appearances, always looks as though his blond hair is beyond redemption, admittedly a wondrous intellect and the very model of eccentricity. He is now desperately trying to bring down a Prime Minister who probably knows that he hates her anyway.

We all know that Boris Johnson has delusions of grandeur, that the clearly egotistical in him would give anything for the keys to 10 Downing Street. Johnson has kept out of the limelight recently, presumably waiting for that opportune moment when Theresa May is at her most vulnerable. He'll then jump out shockingly from some some rain washed bush and insist that he is the man who should be running the country.

Johnson will drag his unsuspecting victim into a quiet cafe, demand that the terms for Brexit be dramatically tweaked and tampered with and do it his way. Because Boris's way is, quite obviously, the right way and you'd better believe it is. We always privately suspected that Boris was power hungry, relentlessly ambitious and determined to get his way. Now that he is no longer associated with the Cabinet Boris seems to be at his happiest. Boris now thinks that the coast is clear and he can say whatever he likes with utter impunity without fearing the consequences.

This has been a clever cloak and dagger almost military operation from all of those ex and serving Cabinet ministers because this is the time to attack the current Prime Minister and then try to knock her over like a set of skittles in a bowling alley. Boris Johnson is still mumbling and muttering under his breath, cursing and sneering, somehow all knowing and maybe deludedly superior to the rest of his ex Tory colleagues.

 Johnson could be that loose cannon, that simmering volcano of jealousy perhaps, whimpering and wailing, gnashing his teeth, holding back the fury, that seething disapproval, a man with that Etonian sense of moral outrage, a supercilious grin and that epic hair with a mind of its own so to speak. Another Johnson from the pages of literary history said quite memorably that when a man is tired of London he is tired of life but there are no Boswells around so perhaps Boris Johnson does indeed have a soft spot for London and the rest of the world.

The likes of David Davis and Michael Gove have quite possibly said their piece and it's hard to tell whether neither knows what they want for the future welfare of the British people. Davis quit recently but still felt he had something worthwhile to offer the country and Michael Gove reminds you of one of those sixth form school prefects who knows everything and studies encyclopedias in his spare time.

But here we are back at the same drawing board and not really knowing how to react to anything in particular. We stare blankly at our TV screens, watch the latest well meaning outbursts on BBC's Question Time and pretend that it isn't really happening. We have to be imagining all of this, it'll just vanish one day and we'll all be left in a state of relieved euphoria. And yet when we woke up this morning it was still there, still bubbling away, boiling over rather like one of those old kettles in our kitchen that kept whistling away and lasted for goodness knows how long.

Eventually though some very considerate soul will take pity on us one day. One day we'll be spared this rackety, tiresome news story and political hot potato that looks less appetising by the day. Soon we may have to build shelters at the bottom of our garden just to escape from this constant blathering, this ear blasting cacophony of sound and noise, this idiotic ranting, this appalling abuse of power, these shameful verbal outpourings, this complete political mess.

One of these days we'll all wake up and it'll all have gone away, a seemingly eternal nightmare of bawling, bellowing voices and patronising playground insults now no more than a memory. We shall sit down to watch the early evening news, confident in the knowledge that no harm will come to our besieged ear drums.

There will be life after Brexit and one day next year in early April we'll wonder what all the fuss was about. We'll fling open the curtains or blinds, indulge ourselves in the biggest bowl of muesli or marmalade on toast, drink our first cup of Cappuccino and then prepare ourselves for a day free from the voices of anger, angst and hostility. The days of soft and hard Brexiteering, Irish backstops and front gardens, herbaceous borders and Custom Houses will be a thing of the past. If only.

Finally we can forget first referendums and second referendums, of in fighting and out fighting, personal grudges, mad temper tantrums and niggly irritations. Over two years have now passed since that fateful day when the good people of Great Britain said, quite categorically, that they wanted out of the European Union, to leave Europe for good, to rid ourselves of European bureaucrats and faceless law makers who just kept hindering our progress.

No longer would they have to be bound by Brussels red tape, the stifling laws imposed from on high. Britain wanted global recognition, more room to manoeuvre, space to breathe, the opportunity to trade and barter with the Far East, those tropical islands in the sun but then you probably knew that anyway. It's time to set sail into that big, wide world and time for Britain to conquer new lands and territories. It's so good to be healthy and alive. Oh for another discussion on Brexit. Please anything but.