Theresa May must unite the country behind Brexit in 2017 or risk deeper divisions than ever

BRITAIN spent 2016 bitterly divided. For all our sakes that has to end — and today seems like a good time to start.

So we applaud that Theresa May has put that sentiment at the heart of her New Year message.

But wishing for it won’t make it so.

If we are no longer to be Leavers or Remainers “but one great union of people with a bright future” then one thing must happen. Those still in denial about Brexit’s inevitability, bent on preventing or fatally stalling it and heaping abuse on the majority who voted for it, have to stop and wake up.

There can be no reversing the referendum result without terrible danger to our democracy and our stability.

Delaying Brexit will hurt our prospects too.

So will lobbying for some fudged deal which still bars Britain from making lucrative trade agreements with the major nations outside the EU. That guarantees the worst possible result for our prosperity.

We welcome the PM renewing her focus on the “have-nots” too. We hope her Chancellor’s March Budget will help them more tangibly than last November’s.

Tragic MP Jo Cox argued that we all had “more in common than that which divides us”. We would love to see her proved right this year.

We at The Sun on Sunday hope 2017 is happy and prosperous — for our fantastic readers and for ALL of Britain.

Britain's gong mad

IN any other line of work, Detective Chief Superintendent Gordon Briggs would have been rewarded with the sack.

He ran the disastrous, politically-motivated £30million Operation Elveden, which failed to convict a single journalist of any crime. Yet the retired cop has been given ­policing’s highest medal in the New Year’s ­Honours. What would he have got had it succeeded? A peerage?

Honours are supposed to be for exceptional, admirable work beyond the call of duty. Or for those like Sir Mo or Dame Jess whose feats inspire the nation.

Not for coppers who aren’t worth a dime.

Beeb's Brussels Cash

NO one did more than the BBC to try to ­persuade the nation to vote Remain.

Now we discover the Corporation has trousered £300,000 from EU funds after the Brexit vote.

But the so-called balanced and impartial Beeb has failed to report this fact.

Does the BBC secretly stand for Brussels Broadcasting Corporation?