A circular building topped with a union jack dome rises from the trees on the Swanscombe peninsula in Kent. With its flag tightly wrapped around a glass bubble, it looks like a little Brexit capsule, safely sealed off from the free movement and free markets of the outside world.

This is the proposed entrance pavilion to the London Resort, a £3.5bn theme park planned for the Thames estuary. This walled kingdom of themed “lands” would rise from the muddy marshes by 2024, just as Boris Johnson nears the end of this term as PM. The first images of this planned dreamland were unveiled a few days before the election and the project now seems like a fitting metaphor for the result. Why elect a government that would address social welfare, tackle rising homelessness and fix the NHS, when you can build a parallel fantasy world instead?