Priti Patel denies freedom of movement to man wearing mind-reading exoskeleton

A smirking Priti Patel has insisted that a Frenchman who can walk for the first time in two years using a thought-controlled exoskeleton, won’t get further than Dover.

Monsieur Thibault, a handsome Parisian, has been given a new lease of life thanks to an “intelligent” mechanical frame, linked to sophisticated software designed by a nicotine-addicted IT expert named Jacques.

The 28-year-old insists being able to move again for the first time was like “walking on the moon”, which after the October Brexit deadline, will be a good deal easier than entering England, fucked-up spine or no fucked-up spine.

Thibault sustained his life-changing injury after arguing about philosophy in a café on the Champs Elysees, but thanks to the cutting-edge development, is now able to breakdance.

The exoskeleton enables the user to stand without pain in a customs queue for hours on end while being needlessly interrogated by bloodthirsty UK Immigration Officers.

An interface powered by his pre-frontal cortex will enable Thibault to bend forward while an over-enthusiastic border guard shoves a hand so far up his back passage that he can tickle his hippocampus.

Ms Patel now fears a wave of Eastern Europeans using exoskeletons to overcome their disabilities and flood places like Grimsby with cheap, slow-response labour carried out mostly from a resting position.

Meanwhile, the Home Secretary has called for the operating systems of all artificial skeletons to be downgraded to Windows Vista in case paralysed foreigners use their new-found freedom to sneak onto a lorry bound for Kent – as soon as they’ve relearned how to feed themselves.

Last night, Monsieur Thibault announced that he had no plans whatsoever to live and work in the UK, either as a nurse with an adorable accent or as some kind of Robocop in Patel’s forthcoming fascist junta.

He added, “Zut alors – I ‘ave seen what the British do to people with disabilities.”