We know now it was in those benighted communities of north-east England and the Midlands where the most scurrilous lies of the Brexiters found their most fertile ground. It was in these places where they swallowed the myths and monsters of Johnson and Farage’s wretched imaginations most readily. You could hardly blame them, though.

For decades they had watched helplessly as their communities, in which England had mined deeply to find cannon fodder for its wars of empire and liberation, were broken and left to die. Up and down England’s east coast, towns and villages were brought low as tens of thousands of steel and fishing jobs were sacrificed to fund Margaret Thatcher’s economic miracle or as trading chips to ensure the Americans could observe Soviet submarines from Iceland.

Instead of an economic recovery plan with sustainable jobs and skills training we gave them shopping malls and zero-hours contracts. So when the Westminster establishment and almost every one of their favourite newspapers told them the foreigners were to blame and that there will be highly-paid construction jobs for all those new hospitals soon to be built the fix was in. We’ll have no hand-wringing, sanctimonious nonsense from north of the border about possessing higher values. Plenty up here swallowed the same lies; it’s just that England, with ten times our population, had more.

Who knows how long it will take for them to discover that, once again, they have been conned by that tiny Westminster elite who would all require sat-navs to locate their communities? And that they had all been used once more as pawns in a grab for power inside the Tory party? How long will it take for them to recover this time?

They must be slightly curious at how quickly Theresa May and her new cabinet have got over the shock of Brexit. Even David Cameron appears simply to have stuck his chin out and gathered up his belongings graciously in his old kit bag. It’s amazing, isn’t it, how money, power and influence can help you adjust in times of adversity?

There was David, witty and generous at his last despatch box, seemingly caring not a jot that he’d been emptied by his own lack of political judgment. And there he was again moving Samantha and the children into a £17 million, three-storey townhouse owned by his friend; the chap who also owns the country’s biggest corporate PR and lobbying firm. Well, the favours all have to be returned some day and this must have seemed as good a day as any to start. And look, as The Times revealed this week, the Camerons have just secured a loan of £800,000 on their own mortgage-free £3.2m home. Just enough to cover the soft furnishings and proper holidays where you no longer need to pretend you’re one of the people by flying with those beastly budget airlines.

And there was Theresa who had apparently campaigned to remain in the Europe Union. She got to run the country after keeping her head down. I’m sure she’d also have recovered from the shock of Brexit, even if she hadn’t won her prize. After all, her husband Phillip works as an investment banker for a firm which controls £1.4trillion of funds for companies who legally avoid paying UK taxes.

The newspaper moguls who all urged us to Leave also did so in the knowledge their shooting estates, porn empires and property portfolios would provide a soft landing if Brexit turned ugly. What do all these people care whether we are in Europe or out of it? Just so long as Britain continues to be run by their sort; the right sort; those who were bred for this purpose – that is all that ever matters.

“Brexit means Brexit,” averred Prime Minister May, thus dismantling any lingering hopes that we might find a way of pulling back from the brink.

“I have already said that I won’t be triggering Article 50 until I think we have a UK approach and objectives for negotiations,” she said yesterday. Ms May and her supporters still think this is all a jolly wheeze and that Britain will be able to lay down the law to our former EU partners. This is like the burglar who broke into your house last night and stole all the family silver turning up on the doorstep this morning and offering to sell them back.

Mrs May thinks somehow she can stop free movement of EU migrants to the UK while maintaining existing trading privileges. The six founding EU members however are adamant you can’t have one without the other. I’m sure once Mrs May gives them all a stern talking-to they’ll quickly get in line.

Of course, it won’t really matter ordinary workers’ job security will be just a little bit more reduced without the protection of Europe or that industrial relations will revert to the way they were in the Victorian age. Hasn’t Mrs May told us she will be the champion of ordinary workers and the enemy of asset-stripping multi-nationals; that she will usher in a new golden age of industrial relations and allow everyone to share in their company’s profits? Didn’t she also say people felt the economy didn’t work for everyone and it was “ordinary members of the public” who had made real sacrifices after the 2008 financial crash?

I suppose we’ll just have to take it on trust that a softer, more caring Theresa May has emerged from those days when she voted against getting more young people into work and against banking reforms. Or, when she voted not to curb the excesses of the energy cartels and not to build 100,000 new, affordable homes and resisted vital investment in housing infrastructure.

After all, 37 years ago the last female Prime Minister pledged to bring harmony where there was discord and hope where there was despair. Unfortunately, a toxic cocktail of revolting miners, chippy Scots and unreasonable types who wouldn’t bend the knee to capitalism wrecked her dream. But you can’t fault her for trying. Let’s hope Mrs May has better luck. Unlike Mrs Thatcher though, Mrs May won’t have a pesky Labour Party dogging her steps. Two opinion polls this week show a Labour Party led by Jeremy Corbyn could win the next election, despite the hysterical claims of the right-wing commentariat. So, just as well the campaign of lies, harassment and character assassination of Mr Corbyn mounted by her outriders in the press and by the Tory sleepers in the People’s Party is coming to fruition.

It’s a long time since a British Prime Minister ever pursued an authentic Socialist agenda. Since then the rich and the powerful have never had it so good and, by jove, we’re not going to let Mr Corbyn spoil the party.