Patrick O’Flynn, on behalf of the EFDD Group. – Madam President, despite Mr Juncker’s determination to give a punishment beating to the United Kingdom, the current impasse is not exclusively his fault. It has been your misfortune almost as much as ours to be dealing with the worst prime minister in British history, someone who stands for nothing and can deliver nothing. When someone is so passive about having sand kicked in their face, it takes a restrained kind of bully to walk off the beach. We know from its dealings with Greece and others that the Commission is not a restrained kind of bully.

But you would be making a terrible mistake to assume that Mrs May is representative of the British people. You have men like Tony Blair whispering in your ear about the dream of the British suddenly embracing your project of integration. Do not believe it. We are a different kind of European nation. We have a different history, a different geography and different modern networks too. You should ask why Blair, in his pomp, could not risk a referendum on euro membership. You should ask why Brown could not risk a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty and you should ask why Cameron, when he was forced to hold a referendum on membership, lost it to the greatest number of British people ever to vote for anything.

Finally, you should ask yourselves why – after being threatened with no food, no water, no medicines and no jobs – the latest polls show that more British people wish to leave the EU with no deal next Friday than to remain. Once you’ve asked these questions then you should look ahead. You should imagine how Mrs May’s successor would seek to rebuild shattered Tory support before the next general election if we have not left. He or she will be leading a party whose potential support is overwhelmingly formed of leave voters. Do not expect consistency from the Conservatives, by the way. The Tooting Popular Marxist Front will not last.

Instead, the answer is obvious, Guy Verhofstadt is right. The successor will seek to rebuild support by making your lives a misery through vetoes and political sabotage, by rejecting every proposed development of your project. So, reject another extension, resolve that Brexit will happen on WTO terms next Friday, and then negotiate constructively to tie up the loose ends after that. Do this and we can still be your best customer, but lock us in and we will be your worst nightmare.