Is the UK turning into a nation of extremes?

But the Speaker’s cry is a perfect reflection of the state of today’s politics in Britain – and all signs suggest we are heading towards dangerous territory.

Brexit first split the country in terms of the vote, but things have tumbled downhill since then.

Politicians are being verbally abused in the streets. Some have received death threats and warned not to return home.

MPs who support the Government’s deal are pilloried because, well, it’s not a proper Brexit.

Those who want Brexit (but not the PM’s version) are vilified as hardliners who are against their party, while those who don’t want us to leave the EU at all are decried as “traitors” and “undemocratic”.

On a daily basis outside Parliament hundreds of people parade around in silly costumes, carrying placards and shouting pro- or anti-Brexit slogans into the sky.

As a nation we must look like fools to outsiders, and there is little doubt that whole fiasco shines a light on a seriously damaged political system.

It shows how leadership and opposition have been unable to cope when an issue that required compromise and nous was presented before them.

How can a middle-ground be reached when our two main parties have each divided into warring camps?

Labour’s main party – the one Jeremy Corbyn heads up – resembles a hard left cabal of Marxists plotting a half-baked Government takeover with all the aptitude of a students union at a middling 1980s polytechnic.

Then there’s the party within the party – the dozens of MPs led by Tom Watson who are desperately clinging onto the seemingly forlorn hope that Labour’s social democratic tradition may one day make a comeback.

Meanwhile the Tories have quickly ditched Theresa May’s dismal version of the ‘one nation’ blueprint and split into at least two gangs.

Those to the right, most notably Boris Johnson and Jacob Rees-Mogg, are appalled at the Government’s version of Brexit – although they both managed to vote for it (out of a sense of duty, you understand).

Centre-ground Conservatives are also appalled – at what they perceive to be their party’s lurch towards the right.

They all have two things in common: A mutual distrust, and the fact that most of them are seemingly unable to grasp the nature of what “true Conservatism” means in 2019 (all suggestions to our letters page, please).

Heck, even the PM’s cabinet is divided.

But it’s not just the Tories and Labour.

Lib Dem MP Norman Lamb, a parliamentarian of some 18 years, says he is considering quitting the party over its refusal to compromise on Brexit.

“It’s not the sort of politics that I favour,” he said. “I favour trying to find common ground.”

The SNP, which has 35 MPs in Westminster has also adopted a “my way or the highway” stance on the EU, with Nicola Sturgeon making it clear that the only sort of Brexit that she would countenance is no Brexit at all.

And while the main parties drown in failure as they dance with the extremes, the road opens up for others to fill the breach.

Step forward the rebooted version of Ukip, which is seeing membership numbers surge on the back of a hatred of Islam and a love of Tommy Robinson.

There are others. Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party may contest this year’s Euro elections, while the far-right For Britain movement will be hoping to gain seats in the upcoming council elections.

MPs in The Independent Group, aka Change UK, believe they can change the status quo and provide voters with “a new alternative”. But they are another lot who are completely unwilling to compromise on Brexit.

Spurred on by legions of social media warriors, politics has become black or white. You’re either with us or you’re against us.

Any willingness to see more than one side of an argument is blasted as “fence sitting” by a crowd baying: “For Christ’s sake nail your colours to the mast!!”

There is no Brexit crisis in this country, it is without doubt a political crisis.

And as the fringes of political argument enter the mainstream, the worrying likelihood of the UK becoming a nation of extremes increases.