The latest round of Brexit talks are over – and things look bleaker than ever for the UK

Will it all be over by Christmas? Either way, it looks probable that by then we will have to know if it is to be a hard or soft Brexit.

By the time David Davis wishes his counterpart, EU negotiator Michel Barnier, “un Joyeux Noël” – if he can bring himself to – the world will know whether there is to be a hard Brexit or some form of exit from the European Union that will be less ruinous than that.

Well, they say miracles happen at Christmas.

Given the shortness of the deadlines, and, crucially, the need for the UK to construct a customs bureaucracy and otherwise plan for a move to World Trade Organisation rules, a decision on the outcome must be made, practically, by the time of the EU summit in December. We will then have, as business and everyone else apparently wishes, “certainty”.

Certain catastrophe, in fact.

There was little attempt on the part of Mr Davis or Mr Barnier, a double act with two straight men, to disguise the extent of the gulf between them. Nor was there any need for Mr Barnier to labour the point that it is the EU that possesses most of the leverage in this tussle. It is for him to propose to the European Council that the talks have made sufficient progress and therefore future trading arrangements can be discussed. It is for the European Council and, in due course, the European Parliament to approve the eventual deal on trade, if there is to be one. They are not required to approve “no deal”.

If Michel Barnier and the EU are being “unreasonable”, “arrogant” or “foolish” then so what? There is not a single thing the British can do about it except splutter and wallow in the purple prose of the Eurosceptic press. Cold comfort that will prove pointless when the car factories start closing.

The “Brexit now” school of British thought, if that’s not too grand a term for it, believes that the EU needs the UK more than the UK needs the EU; that walking away now would show the bloc that the British mean business; and that there is no price too high anyway to regain sovereignty and “take back control”.

That dangerous and delusional opinion is vocally represented on the Conservative back benches and finds a powerfully eloquent, if buffoonish, advocate in Boris Johnson, who can spot and exploit a useful Tory grievance from the other side of the planet, whither he is so often despatched by the Prime Minister. Hence all the opprobrium poured on the head of the Chancellor, Philip Hammond, for merely doing his job, protecting the economy and telling his colleagues and the nation a few home truths about what may be about to befall the British economy.

We are where we are, as the tired political saying goes. If things really are as bad as they seem to be then, yes, it is indeed wise to make certain contingencies, as that is preferable to the planes being grounded, the lorries stacked up at the Channel ports, City banks being unable to settle contracts and the factories falling silent for lack of components on 30 March 2019. Why, the British might not even be able to bring in sufficient German lager, Swedish cider, Italian prosecco, Irish stout and French champagne to celebrate their “freedom”.

There is a better way, however, and one that at least has a chance of carrying a more united, or less bitterly fractured, nation through all of this. If, by the end of this year it is apparent that the future is a “no deal” kind of Brexit, then that must be placed before the British people in a final vote on what will be the known terms of EU withdrawal. Emphatically, to be cut off entirely from any arrangement with the EU on trade was not what the British people wanted in the referendum. As Mr Hammond memorably observed, no one voted to become poorer.

By January 2018, then, the nation may well be able to weigh up the realities of staying or leaving more realistically than in 2016. Whatever sums will be saved from the contributions to the EU budget, whatever benefits (doubtful) from reducing EU migration, from ending the role of European Court of Justice and from striking new trade deals with fast-growing emerging nations can be set against the all too apparent downsides of Brexit.

The British can take a conscious, informed decision to risk a return to the Irish troubles, accept the possible exit for Northern Ireland and Scotland from the UK, the isolation of Gibraltar, loss of diplomatic clout and contemplate the loss of jobs in manufacturing and the City, low economic growth, worse public services and higher taxes and inflation.

We can, in other words, leave with our eyes open, or we can stay in with our eyes open. The voters will no longer be so easily distracted by mirages when they are staring down the barrel of an economic gun.

Brexit just got real.