Brexiteers didn't want to build a sandcastle, they wanted to kick one down – and they've kept kicking at the ruins

They will continually state that Britain is 'outward looking' and 'open for business', and of course, how better to assure the investors of the world than to agitate for the loud and public defenestration of the nominally independent head of the central bank Mark Carney?

Bank of England Governor Mark Carney leaves Downing Street (Reuters)

Given that Britain will, at some point soon, start seeking to do a trade deal with Canada, it should probably be cause for concern that a Canadian who has been so utterly outmanoeuvred by the political class in his own country should have found it so easy to outmanoeuvre the political class over here.

Mark Carney, it is often idly repeated, has political ambitions of his own back home in Canada. But rarely is it repeated that the job to which he aspires is currently taken by an even younger, even better-looking, even more globally adored Prime Minister from his own party.

For the meantime, then, he will have to do his manoeuvring here, and evidently he’s not bad at it.

Cameron, Osborne and the remainers have been vanquished, and Carney remains. The Brexiteers call for his departure, and he is begged by the new Prime Minister to stay – and successfully it seems.

Mr Carney has given every side the argument something to go on. He will leave in July 2019, in the quarter after Britain is expected to leave the EU. A year longer than the five years he said he would serve, but still two years shorter than the full eight year term. All sides may claim success.

It should hardly come as a surprise that a certain type of Brexwit called for so long for Carney’s resignation. When the Governor of the Bank of England warned, in May, that Brexit would lead to a sharp drop in sterling, Jacob Rees-Mogg clamoured for his immediate resignation, a clamouring that has only got louder since sterling dropped by 10 per cent in 10 minutes in the early hours of June 24, and a further eight per cent since.

On Monday morning, Daniel Hannan warned the Governor he must “stick to his brief”. It is almost uncharitable to point out this is the same Dan Hannan whose brief to represent the voters of south-east England in the European Parliament has currently cost Mr, Mrs, Herr, Frau, Madame and Mademoiselle Taxpayer around £1.7m.

But Carney’s critics, newly emboldened, do not have their scalp.

We should not, of course, be surprised that the Brexwits wanted Carney gone. Brexit was never about building a sandcastle, only kicking one down – and now that it is down, it is no shock that the Brexiteers’ imaginations cannot extend any further than to keep kicking at the ruins. To do anything else would have required some semblance of a plan.

They will continually state that Britain is “outward looking” and “open for business”, and of course, how better to assure the investors of the world than to agitate for the loud and public defenestration of the nominally independent head of the central bank? But remember, these are the same people who talk of the crashing pound being great for Britain’s exports at the same time as seeking to close down what is arguably Britain’s only world class export – higher education – to the foreign students desperate to purchase it. (And yes, oh angry Brexiteering keyboard warrior limbering up over the comments section, foreign people coming to British universities is an export. I mention this for your benefit and no one else’s.)

It is a pity Carney is not quite the “rockstar banker” his deriders deride him as. A truly flair player would have issued a formal warning from the Central Bank of the consequences of his own dismissal. But the markets can do the talking for him. Sterling dropped a cent against the dollar when news of his early exit seemed imminent. Now he is staying, it has recovered again.

The only mystery is why Jacob Rees-Mogg and the rest have not yet called for his resignation for almost resigning.