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May's government is driven from the front. We just don't know the direction | John Crace

May and Trudeau
May and Trudeau looking forward to a new UK/Canada trade agreement. Let’s hope it is similar to their deal with the EU. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA

Theresa May kept her gaze lowered. Fixed mainly on Justin Trudeau’s shoes. It’s not often the prime minister comes up against another world leader with better footwear. Besides, she didn’t particularly want to catch anyone’s eye as she didn’t have much to say. Or rather she did, but not in front of the media.

“Merci, Justin,” she said after the Canadian prime minister had kick-started their joint press conference by trying to wrack his brains for anything meaningful they had discussed over the last hour or so. They had chatted about how much they liked each other, what a deep and rich history their countries shared, how they hoped trade between Canada and the UK would continue after Brexit and how it was great that a couple of branches of Tesco had just opened in Montreal.

The Maybot elaborated a little more. She was delighted that the trade agreement between Canada and the EU had finally been negotiated after seven years and she very much hoped Britain and Canada could trade along the same lines after Brexit. With the words EU crossed out and UK inserted in their place. If you closed your eyes it would be just like nothing had happened. Trudeau was momentarily distracted by a flying pig. Realising she had made a compelling case for Britain remaining in the EU, she swiftly went off on a tangent to talk about the importance of the upcoming joint military exercise with the Canadians in Latvia.

Understandably a few heads began to go down in the audience. They hadn’t come to hear about Theresa’s fantasy trade deals: they had come to talk about Boris. The BBC’s John Pienaar was the first to mention the foreign secretary’s less than helpful intervention at the weekend. Would she tolerate backseat driving on Brexit?

“The UK government is driven from the front, and we all have the same destination in our sights,” the prime minister said, rather unconvincingly. She just didn’t know who was actually sitting in the driving seat or what their shared destination was. With her circuits overloading, the prime minister lapsed into basic Maybot. She was focused on getting “the best possible deal with the EU” and “looking forward to future negotiations being conducted in a constructive manner”. It was almost back to Brexit means Brexit.

Or Boris means Boris. Earlier in the day the Maybot had told reporters that “Boris is Boris”. A phrase not guaranteed to provide much reassurance. After all it’s bad enough the whole country thinking the foreign secretary is an untrustworthy, narcissistic buffoon, without discovering that opinion is shared by the person who appointed him. And is too weak to sack him.

The Maybot was no more expansive on trade deals post Brexit. Other than that we would be getting a very good one that was hers and hers alone. “I don’t recognise the simple binary approach,” she added, failing to appreciate how her own language was coded. By the time she got on to why one of the chief negotiators had had to be moved from the Brexit department, she was in near meltdown. It wasn’t a shambles, she insisted. Rather it was a sign of how well everything was going and that now negotiations were in a more intensive phase he had to be moved away from David Davis as the minister couldn’t be trusted to get anything right.

Over in New York, Boris was being interviewed by Sky News in his first public appearance since his weekend bombshell. He couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about. Everyone had totally misread his intentions. Boris tugged at his hair and looked shifty throughout. A sure sign he was lying. For someone who spends so much time trading in half-truths, he’s extraordinarily easy to read. “Let’s not find rows where there aren’t rows,” he protested feebly. “I was only trying to be helpful.” Helpful as in unhelpful. Like the Maybot had said, the government was united. In its disunity and disloyalty.