Theresa May can probably be forgiven for failing to find a way out of the Brexit labyrinth to date but her term of office might well be summed up by her inability to even offer a coherent strategy for her own scheduled retirement.
While Mrs May is widely regarded as a sincere and public spirited figure, with a dogged ability to stick to what she sees as her duty in the most difficult of circumstances, the evidence is that she was always an accidental prime minister.
David Cameron’s catastrophic misjudgment over the EU referendum three years ago not only swept him out of Downing Street but triggered a remarkable sequence of events which saw Mrs May’s rivals for the vacancy drop out one by one until she was the only contender left standing.
Irish observers had an early sense of alarm when she arrived for a Belfast engagement as a strongly pro-remain home secretary on the eve of the 2016 poll, and declared it was inconceivable that the existing border arrangements could be retained if the UK left the EU, only to reinvent herself as a Brexit-supporting premier shortly afterwards and assure us that all north/south issues were under control.
It was the first of many u-turns by Mrs May, the most spectacular coming earlier this year when, after painstaking and prolonged negotiations with European leaders, she endorsed a comprehensive overall withdrawal agreement with specific provision for an Irish backstop and then rejected her own proposal as soon as she came under pressure from the DUP.
Mrs May could argue that she had few options other than to cut a deal with Arlene Foster’s party after her failed gamble that she could increase her parliamentary majority through an entirely unnecessary UK general election in 2017.
However, the perilous prospect of a minority administration must seem almost attractive in retrospect when compared to the reality of handling what turned out to be a turbulent and ultimately toxic relationship with the DUP.
The reality is that Mrs May has displayed little understanding of or interest in Irish affairs, whether they involved the nationalist or unionist traditions, and, together with her unfortunate choice as secretary of state, Karen Bradley, proved totally incapable of coming up with a plan for the restoration of the Stormont institutions.
What is profoundly depressing in terms of our political process is that neither the main Conservative candidates last night lining up to succeed her nor the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn have provided credible indications that they are capable of a better performance.