Steve Baker called for the European Union to be "wholly torn down"

You may have heard Steve Baker, the new minster at the Brexit department, interviewed by Nick Robinson on the Today programme this morning.

He used the new government line about listening to people and then proceeded to rubbish every view from other organisations that Nick Robinson put to him.

It was a masterly piece of interviewing, proving once again that a sustained line of questioning is far more deadly than bluster and bullying. (Are you listening, Paxman and Humphrys?)

But we should not have been surprised at Baker's unwillingness to listen. Here he is in 2007 calling for the European Union to be "wholly torn down".

If the government is serious about Brexit it needs the most skilled diplomats you can imagine.

Instead, it has appointed a team of ideologues and clowns.