Perhaps we should call it the new European disease: the inability of European electorates to produce clear election results. On Wednesday night, the Dutch joined the club, already inhabited by Germany, Austria and the Czech Republic.

There is no majority in the Netherlands on the centre-left, and no majority on the centre-right, so it looks as if the only option is to form a grand left-right coalition, just as the Christian Democrats and Social Democrats were forced to do last year in Germany.