Theresa May shows Brexit is nothing like Groundhog Day – it is a waste of time with no happy ending

Can anyone be certain Theresa May's latest Brexit statement wasn’t some sort of hostage video recorded months ago, perhaps by Jacob Rees-Mogg wearing a balaclava under his top hat?

We are, I fear, at the point of Brexit where if Theresa May seriously wants people to believe she hasn’t been dead for months she’s going to have to begin her “updates” by holding a copy of today’s newspaper in front of her face.

Because it’s February 2019 now, fully two months since she cancelled her “meaningful vote” on her Brexit deal, saying she would have to go and negotiate changes to the backstop. And here she was again, on her feet in the House of Commons, for approximately the eight hundredth time, breezily spelling out how she was busy “negotiating changes to the backstop”, and that she’d just need a little bit more time, if possible, to go to Brussels and negotiate some more changes to the backstop.

I was there. I saw it with my own eyes. But even I can’t be certain it wasn’t some sort of hostage video recorded months ago, probably by Jacob Rees-Mogg wearing a balaclava under his top hat.

Because, as someone once said, nothing has changed. The House of Commons says no to the backstop. Brussels says no to the commons. Theresa May shuttles between them like a beleaguered waiter, stuck with an unbearable customer and an impossible chef.

It’s a pity Brexit is so very serious, as it has dampened the British public’s enjoyment of its true purpose, which is as an interactive art installation on mankind and the perception of time. On the one hand, Brexit is a terrifying ticking clock, the sands of time running out at accelerating speed. On the other, it is a neverending moment, frozen in eternity, stretching beyond the infinite horizon, unchanged, undimmed.

Seasons come and go. Theresa May negotiates changes to the backstop. Cicadas sleep for seventeen summers. Theresa May negotiates changes to the backstop. Civilisations rise and fall. Suns explode. Theresa May negotiates changes to the backstop. A national anxiety dream, suspended in a milisecond that lasts forever. What even is the backstop? Can any of us really say we know? Is that it, coming over the hill? What’s going on? Why have my legs turned to stone?

It has, they say, become like Groundhog Day. But it’s become like Groundhog Day because all anyone ever says, day after day, is that it’s become like Groundhog Day. As Theresa May spoke, Labour’s Stephen Doughty muttered loudly and performatively to himself and to those who had no choice but to hear, “It’s like Groundhog Day! It’s like Groundhog Day!”

For the avoidance of doubt, Brexit is nothing like Groundhog Day. In the movie Groundhog Day, Bill Murray uses the infinite time suddenly and unexpectedly at his disposal to learn foreign languages, to master ice sculpture and the jazz piano, and also to commit suicide in ever more inventive ways. Theresa May, on the other hand, has absolutely no time at all, she is doing absolutely nothing with it, and the only thing she will not do is end it.

You may also recall that, in the end, it turns out the way to escape from Groundhog Day is first to become a better person, and ultimately to fall in love.

Not to be too pessimistic about it all, but we’ve got a slightly different plot structure on our hands here. We wake from Groundhog Day on March 29th. And here’s a bold prediction – it won’t be love, but a different, albeit related emotion that ultimately conquers all. It already has done.