If Theresa May needed any reminder of what a mountain she has to climb to get her Brexit deal through, she got it in the House of Commons this afternoon. Any hope that getting the deal agreed with the EU 27 might give her momentum was dashed as MP after MP stood up to criticise the agreement. Not one MP supported it in the first hour of the session.
In part, the wall of hostility came from the Speaker calling those known to be hostile to the deal. But what should most worry May was how critical Michael Fallon, the former defence secretary, was of her deal. If party loyalists, men of government types such as Fallon are having doubts about whether to support it, then it is very hard to see how any Tory rebellion can be kept down to a manageable level.
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