For continental Eurosceptics, Brexit was an experiment. Only the British were incautious enough to want to be first out of the door, but many countries were thinking about going second. Brexit’s Monty Pythonesque implosion has put that issue to bed. What you might call “Leave Euroscepticism” — the Boris Johnson version — has discredited itself. What survives is “Remain Euroscepticism”, the version embodied by Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orban: stay in the EU, suck on its teat and, meanwhile, rot the union from the inside. In May’s European elections, Remain-Eurosceptic parties could get 30 per cent of the vote. Long term, they are more dangerous than the hapless Leave Eurosceptics.

Remain Eurosceptics love the single market and European subsidies. When communism fell, Poland had about the same income per capita as Ukraine; now it’s about four times richer, notes Brigid Laffan of the European University Institute in Florence. Moreover, poorer European countries also have bad memories of “standing alone”. Their voters often distrust their national governments even more than they distrust Brussels, says Catherine de Vries of the Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam.

So Remain Eurosceptics aim to stay in the EU while breaking its rules. Hungary and Poland simply refuse the EU’s requirements to take in their quota of refugees. Italy and France flout the Eurozone’s budget rules (while borrowing at 2 per cent thanks to their membership). Most member states ignore European directives on use of plastic bags. Multiple eastern European governments meddle illegally with their judiciaries.