Cheaper food is what Brexiteers promised the public

Many politicians at Westminster seem to want the opposite. They thrive on drama, even if their moment in the limelight of television risks fatally damaging the party they represent.

Journalists and estate agents are grateful for politicians, since they rank lower in public esteem than both those groups. That has not been improved by events at Westminster. Love or loathe Theresa May, she is playing the hand she was dealt after the referendum and the big error of calling an election last year. The bile from some of the pro-Brexit members of her own party is bullying and in some cases misogynistic. It is also self-defeating, in that it is driving people in the centre, who may disagree with her views, to support her.

It is no surprise that the leaders of the four UK farm unions have issued a joint statement in favour of the draft Withdrawal Agreement. They, like everyone else, can see it is not perfect, but unlike a lot of politicians, they know that in a negotiation neither side ever gets all they want.

By contrast, the extreme Brexit advocates display the zeal of any fundamentalist that believes in the absolute purity of their cause. Most businesses are built around buying and selling in the hope of a profit, and in that process you rarely get all you want. The trick is to secure an outcome that leaves both sides feeling they have gained. Over Brexit, politicians criticising business fail to understand that pragmatism.

This is why every business organisation in the UK, including the farm unions, has said that the document on the table is a sensible basis for a deal with the EU-27. It will never be perfect. EU membership was never perfect; membership of the European Economic Area, with Norway, would not be perfect; the so-called Canada Plus trade deal would certainly not be perfect.

Whatever outcome emerges will not satisfy everyone, not least because the Leave margin over Remain in the referendum was so narrow. What is certain is that for industry a no deal outcome would be a disaster that would cost thousands of jobs across the UK and decimate agriculture. The only winners would be the extreme Brexit wing of the Conservative party, which could well end up out of government after a no deal outcome.

There can be no denying that the deal on offer will disappoint many farmers who voted for Brexit in 2016. It will continue to bind the UK to the EU for at least two years. We will still have to meet the standards of the CAP in agriculture, even if we are no longer part of the policy. However the plus side of that equation is that it offers stability, and a bridge to a hopefully different policy for UK agriculture.

Critics of the agreement need to remember that one of our best defences against a flood of cheap food imports would be that this would not be possible so long as we are in a customs union with the EU-27.

That, I suspect, is one of the reasons the radical Brexiteers want to escape the single market. They see cheap food imports as a way to secure trade deals and make people believe, through lower prices on supermarket shelves, that Brexit delivered for them.

The best test of the Withdrawal Agreement's acceptability in farming is a simple question. That is whether the alternative of crashing out of the EU-27 next March would deliver a better outcome. The answer, according to all the farm unions is a very definite no, with a warning that trading with the EU-27 on the basis of World Trade Organisation tariffs would be disastrous.

If that is the case, the deal – with all its imperfections – has to be the decision made with our business heads, even if for many their hearts want more from Brexit. That more radical outcome will take time, but the deal on offer is a bridge and a way to secure more time to reach a trade deal. That is a view gaining acceptance with the electorate, but getting it though parliament, in the face of Tory rebels and a recalcitrant DUP, remains a challenge.