The successful Gina Miller case, in December 2016, though ultimately politically fruitless, haunted the start of the fixed two-year period for the UK to withdraw from the EU. Might there be another case in the making, this time politically fruitful, which helps achieve Brexit on 29 March 2019, on the basis of a draft withdrawal agreement devoid of the Irish backstop?

On 15 January 2019 – a date etching in history – the UK parliament voted against the draft EU withdrawal agreement, by 432 votes to 202.

The prime minister’s unreconstructed plan B of 21 January 2019, did give rise to the odd flash of new thinking among some MPs, including the idea of the Irish and UK governments negotiating ‘no hard border’ bilaterally, under the Belfast (or Good Friday) agreement, now that EU multilateralism has failed catastrophically.

The Belfast agreement of 10 April 1998 helped end the Northern Ireland troubles. Among the institutions created was the British-Irish intergovernmental conference, ‘to promote bilateral co-operation at all levels on all matters of mutual interest within the competence of both Governments.’