Any hopes that the parliamentary recess would help resolve the great Brexit impasse have been dashed. MPs have returned from their break more entrenched in their positions.
The essential facts remain. Theresa May doesn’t have enough votes to pass the withdrawal agreement. Equally, no Brexit option from a second referendum to a customs union has demonstrated that it can command the support of the Commons either. Tory MPs lack confidence in May’s leadership but can’t agree on who should succeed her, which keeps May in place. The consequence of all this: the drift continues.
On the Tory side, the debate is fast coming down to what are MPs more scared of: May staying as Prime Minister until December or Boris Johnson taking her place? Most Tory MPs would reject both. But if May departs the scene before a Brexit deal is done, the polling indicates that the most ardent Brexiteer who goes to the membership will win.
MPs decide which two candidates go to the party in the country. There would, undoubtedly, be an operation to try and stop Johnson from making it to the members. He would need the support of a third of the parliamentary party to be sure of reaching the final two. But whoever is the hardest Brexiteer in the last round of MPs voting would have a good chance of getting that.
A rule of thumb is that the worse things are for the Tories, the better for Johnson. Tory MPs will swallow their doubts about him only if they have to. But if the Brexit party continues to eat into the Tory vote, then more and more Tory MPs will start to reach for Johnson.
The 1922 Committee of Tory MPs will be decisive.
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