It was not supposed to be like this, a veteran Brussels diplomat said at the start of this week.
Only last month senior European Union figures had expressed support for the prospect of an increased majority for Theresa May that, they hoped, would make it easier for her to ride out the political flak from a Brexit compromise that they believed she was ready to make.
That prospect has now receded and Brussels is braced for walkouts or even the collapse of negotiations as a weak prime minister uses EU-bashing to try to stamp her authority on a more fractious and Eurosceptic Tory party.
Even worse is the real chance of a hung parliament and political chaos with even more and longer delays to negotiations now that the two-year clock has begun ticking on Britain’s withdrawal from the EU.
There is, to top it all, a “nightmare” scenario of Jeremy Corbyn as prime minister. The EU does not expect that he will be “naked” in negotiations, as Mrs May taunted, but fear that he would preside over a political and financial market meltdown in Britain.
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Campaigning began with Mrs May claiming a Brussels conspiracy against her after insulting briefings from the European Commission of a dinner she hosted for Jean-Claude Juncker, its president, were leaked in April. Nothing could have been further from the truth.
Martin Selmayr, Mr Juncker’s chief of staff and the official said to be behind many of the most lurid briefings, made the EU’s position clear. “We need a strong negotiator, someone who unites the entire nation behind her,” he said last month.
This unprecedented endorsement was significant as the EU abandoned the last Liberal Democrat or Labour remnants of the Remainers who were Mrs May’s main opponents to Brexit.
Then it all went wrong as Mrs May’s collapsing opinion poll lead and manifesto gaffes forced the EU to begin contemplating the grim prospect of negotiations, due to begin on June 19 or 20, with a British government that was anything but strong and stable.
Senior EU officials now fear that if Mrs May has a weak majority then her political space to compromise in Brexit talks would shrink to nothing. “We are expecting a walkout and drama this summer or autumn, especially if the Conservative majority is narrow,” a senior EU diplomat said. “If May needs to turn up the political temperature then the chance of a no deal and disorderly Brexit increase significantly. We were not as concerned in April when the election was called but now we are really worried.”
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With a narrow majority or hung parliament, the EU’s deadline of December for the basic principles of Britain’s exit to be agreed would be in trouble. Then there is the scenario of Mr Corbyn arriving at the EU summit in two weeks’ time amid chaos as markets spasm at the prospect of Brexit combined with a more socialist Britain. “After the Brexit vote that no one predicted, do we face another British nightmare?” one official wondered.
