BREXIT means… Could it now possibly be that very worst thing – Government treachery?

Back in May a Brexit-supporting City financier (there are such) made what seemed an extraordinary claim.

Jeremy Hosking, a Tory donor, who led a pro-Brexit campaign named Brexit Express, suggested that the Government’s apparent mishandling of Brexit was nothing of the sort.

In a letter to The Sunday Telegraph he contended: “Those who think the Government is vacillating or making a mess of Brexit due to incompetence are wrong.

It is part of a strategy, it’s going to plan, and the inference from the experience of Brexit Express is that the Prime Minister herself is probably implicated.”

That “experience” was the rejection, believed by Hosking to have stemmed from No 10, of an offer by the group to help fund pro-Brexit Tory campaigns in Opposition-held constituencies at the last general election.

He explained: “There were 140 of them, all of which would be up for grabs to a party enthusiastic about Brexit. Logically we thought the Tories were up for the task. We were wrong.”

Though around half the offered £700,000 was eventually donated, Hosking claimed: “It was made as difficult as possible to contact the constituencies, let alone give candidates the money. The layman’s presumption that the purpose of the last election was to strengthen the Government in the exit negotiations is therefore false. The real purpose was to face down its core of Brexiteer MPs.”

It’s a damning allegation but hard to substantiate. Now, however, comes testimony from a recent member of Mrs May’s ranks buttressing the charge.

Steve Baker, who resigned as deputy Brexit Secretary alongside his boss David Davis, says he quit on discovering that an “establishment elite” had been preparing an alternative Brexit plan to the official one that he and Mr Davis had been appointed to pursue.

According to him, the Brexit team was preparing a white paper embodying Mrs May’s stated public views when it was suddenly presented with Mrs May’s own white paper at Chequers.

Mr Baker observed: “It does appear to me there’s been a year’s worth of cloak and dagger… An establishment elite who never accepted the fundamental right of the public to choose democratically their institutions are working towards overturning them.”

If true this shows scandalous contempt for the public.

Coinciding with Mr Baker’s allegation of Mrs May’s seeming duplicity is a claim that a recent warning by British manufacturer Airbus that a hard Brexit might force it to relocate overseas was delivered at the request of the Government. It is said the company was approached with the aim of creating “room for manoeuvre” at Chequers. Cloak and dagger? I appoint you the judge.

OPINIONS stimulated by my column are always welcome. But I must refute a statement by a reader that I have “often” referred to war as “glorious.” I have never used any such term. What I have “often” expressed are reservations about wartime recreations. I believe we dwell too much on the world wars. We should commemorate the dead and leave it at that. Glorifying war? Not quite, I think.