There is a famous propaganda poster from World War One, a time when the nations of Europe were tearing at each other’s throats. The poster depicted a worried looking man asked by his two young children: “Daddy, what did YOU do in the Great War?”

A hundred years after the Armistice, relations with Europe are still dominating our national consciousness. But I fear our children will ask of us adults today: “Mummy, Daddy, what did YOU do to prevent a No Deal Brexit?”

Whichever way you voted in the 2016 Referendum, no one voted to leave the UK horribly weakened, both economically and on the world stage. Yet the spectre of a no deal Brexit threatens precisely that: and seems impossible to exorcise within the existing make up of Parliament.

Britain has endured a horrible humbling over the course of the Brexit negotiations since Theresa May triggered Article 50 and imposed her ‘red lines’. Just as telling has been the utter failure of the government to secure the major international trade deals we were told were waiting like ripe, shiny apples.

How did we reach this mess? Inevitably, the responsibility belongs with those politicians who led the Brexit negotiations with the EU. With Theresa May, of course, but also her team of officials, cabinet ministers and Conservative MPs. Oh, and let us not forget the DUP, who have been kept on board with a £1.5 billion taxpayer-funded bung to keep the government in power.

Despite all the humbug and bluster of politicians regarding this national crisis, last week the best analysis came from a 16-year-old Northern Irish girl on BBC Question Time.

She said, “David Cameron made the referendum policy because he didn’t wish to lose 10 or 15 seats to UKIP. And look where it’s got us. This has always been about the Tory party playing party politics with issues that are going to be huge generational changes for all of us.” She went on to argue that we, the ordinary people, should be allowed a general election “and representative democracy, because that’s what this country was built on”.

How ironic when the disenfranchised young, who have most to lose from a no deal Brexit, seem to understand most clearly what’s at stake. Just as with the frightening reality of climate change, the older generation seem hell-bent on messing up their kids’ collective future.

Let’s not fool ourselves with post-Empire fantasies that Britain can somehow ‘stand alone’ on the world stage. No deal Brexit would be a disaster for the majority of people in this country. Travel restrictions, increased red tape at the borders, hikes in food prices and shortages of some food products, damage to exporters of both goods and services, jobs being relocated away from the UK (something already happening), shortages of essential medicines imported from the EU, no clear security or crime co-operation, a likely fall in the value of the pound. The list goes on and on. Pointing out reality is not Project Fear.

Nor is Theresa May’s botched deal ever going to be acceptable to the majority of Leavers or Remainers, in Parliament or out. It gives away too much sovereignty to the EU, guaranteeing us nothing substantive in return. Its sole purpose is to patch the Tory party together and save Mrs May’s political skin.

So what is to be done? Despite the fact that millions of Remain voters gritted their teeth in the hope Leavers would find a workable compromise, this has not occurred. With only days to go before we crash out of the EU on 12th April, I believe it is time for all sides to accept that at present Brexit is a failed project.

Like it or not – and it seems to me a terrible failure of government – we have no viable alternative as a nation but to do one of two things. First, hold an immediate general election. If that cannot be achieved, revoke Article 50 while we still can.

No deal Brexit is a colossal act of self-harm. It is time we stopped banging our heads against the Brexit brick wall and started using them constructively for the national good.