At present it is virtually impossible to make any confident prediction about the future of British politics, or indeed of the British state. The future lies in a fog where shadowy figures can be discerned but none is readily identifiable. Nothing should surprise us, but it now always does. This has been true since the 2015 general election when the Conservatives won an unexpected parliamentary majority, and, as a result, forced David Cameron to have a referendum on whether Britain should leave the EU – a referendum he did not want and which he grotesquely mismanaged.