Give us what we want or we'll kill ourselves

There is a strange negotiating position being proposed by the extreme Brexiteers: if the EU does not give Britain what the government demands, Britain should slash its wrists. In other words, Britain should have all the advantages of a membership of the club without having to pay the membership fee and without having to abide by any of the rules that go with being in the club. And if the EU should not acquiesce to these demands, Britain should walk away without a deal in some kind of peacetime Dunkirk. It's interesting to listen to the extreme Brexiteers explain their thinking. Apparently, the EU needs us more than the UK needs the EU. This argument is based simply on the fact that the EU sells more to us than the UK sells to the EU. Somehow, in the eyes of these people, the UK is an economic superpower rather than the middle ranking power that we are. These people in effect suffer from a political inferiority complex.

The EU has a population more than 7 times that of the UK. The EU economy, even without the UK, is the biggest in the world. As part of the EU, we magnify our national power but outside, we face an economic superpower, the EU, that can largely dictate the agenda. The extreme Brexiteers cannot explain why it is that the UK in the negotiations is having to answer to the EU, not the other way round. If their make-believe world were real, the EU would have to accept our terms, not the other way round.

So a no-deal Brexit is being touted by the extremists. Their inferiority complex is pushing the government to threaten an economic suicide for our nation. The danger now is that these extremist notions will start to get traction within this shambolic government.