Theresa may

Why a no-confidence vote in Theresa May could be closer than she thinks

The consensus in the Conservative party is that Theresa May’s visit to the 1922 Committee last night hasn’t materially changed anything. Those who want her gone are still plotting her demise. A larger group of her MPs are very frustrated and unhappy. And there are still a good number of loyalists prepared to make supportive noises about the Prime Minister in the Chamber or ‘crunch’ meetings like the one last night. What this does suggest is that there won’t be another flood of letters calling for a vote of no confidence in the Prime Minister, though the working theory remains that it is more likely that the threshold of 48

James Forsyth

Even ministers don’t understand Brexit

The Brexit negotiations are becoming so complicated that even the cabinet admits that it doesn’t understand what is going on. The Prime Minister has been told by several of her colleagues that they won’t back any deal she agrees until they have seen written legal advice, setting out what it means. If a Brexit deal is going to be impenetrable even to secretaries of state who have followed every step of the negotiations, what hope does the public have? This extraordinary state of affairs was summed up by the cabinet meeting this week during which ministers discussed where the negotiations stand. Theresa May would agree on the money to pay

Tories rally round Theresa May, but the difficult decisions remain

Theresa May should offer to go to the 1922 Committee every week between now and March 2019. Her appearance led to a, predictable, rallying round. There was the usual desk banging and lots of calls for unity. I’m told there were about half a dozen questions on tone and language following the hideous quotes given to the Sunday papers. Tellingly, Steve Baker, the ERG’s lead organiser, tried to turn the tables and present his group as the real loyalists. He asked the Prime Minister if those Tory MPs saying they would vote down no deal were hurting the her negotiating position. She agreed that this was not helpful. As one

Isabel Hardman

Tory MPs give May an easy ride at Prime Minister’s Questions

Given relations with her own party, Theresa May will have been far more worried about the second half of Prime Minister’s Questions than the first. On the basis of the backbench questions that were asked, the session went pretty well. Only one Tory MP raised Brexit at all, and that was Jacob Rees-Mogg, who asked for assurances that the European Court of Justice would not get the final say on cases arising from the Brexit withdrawal agreement. May was able to tell the Chamber that this wasn’t true – though the Sun’s report this morning on the matter was pretty strong – and that was all for Brexit. Instead, her

May to face 1922 Committee as rumours of rebel letters swirl

Theresa May is to face her MPs at the 1922 Committee tomorrow, it has been confirmed. There had been calls for the Prime Minister to do so, after feverish speculation that Tory MPs were plotting to remove her because of her disappointing Brexit performance. She has clearly decided to take on those critics and face her party, rather than hide and hope that this is all going to go away. One of the reasons MPs are increasingly dissatisfied with the Prime Minister is that she isn’t offering any sense of progress towards a deal, and there will again be demands for her to show that she will win a concession

Hell month – week III: Theresa May attempts to reset the dial

Theresa May is entering her third week of Brexit hell. With no resolution in sight on the issue of the Irish border and suspicion growing over No 10’s grand plan, the Tory party is looking more fractious than ever. As James notes on Coffee House, although every week there are reports of plotting and an incoming confidence vote, it does seem as though there has been a further deterioration of party morale that could prove the last straw. In a bid to avoid that fate, May has penned an article for today’s Sun in which she strikes a more personal tone than usual and promises to press on: ‘Turn on

What has changed with Tory leadership plotting

Ever since Chequers there has been almost constant speculation about an attempt to remove Theresa May but with nothing actually happening. So it is tempting to ignore it all, to conclude that those agitating against Mrs May are all hat and no cattle. But this weekend, something does appear to have changed. Whether it leads to anything remains to be seen, but the shift in the mood does seem worth relating. Yesterday, I received a phone call from a former Cabinet Minister who had never told me before that May should go. This time, he was clear not only that she should, but that there was an active effort underway

Theresa May tries to de-dramatise the transition period

With Conservative MPs across the spectrum seeing red over a mooted extension to the implementation period after the UK leaves the EU, Theresa May attempted to dial down the rhetoric in her EU Council press conference this afternoon. After a disappointing evening which saw the Prime Minister granted neither dinner nor sufficient progress by the EU27, May insisted to hacks that a good Brexit deal was still in sight. On reports that No 10 is planning to extend the transition period by up to a year in a bid to reach a deal, May did not deny the claims – but insisted that this wouldn’t really be an implementation period

James Forsyth

The Irish problem | 18 October 2018

The story of Britain and Ireland’s relationship has, all too often, been one of mutual incomprehension: 1066 and All That summed up the view on this side of St George’s Channel with the line that ‘Every time the English tried to solve the Irish question, the Irish changed the question.’ But Theresa May’s problem right now is that the Irish — and the European Union — won’t change the question and the only answers they’ll accept are unacceptable to Mrs May and her cabinet. To the astonishment of many, the Irish border has become the defining issue of Brexit. There is now a serious and growing risk that the issue

MPs from across the House turn on Theresa May

In the Prime Minister’s statement to the House, Theresa May did her best to insist that despite an impasse in the Brexit negotiations it was business as normal. However, for all May’s claims that the differences between the UK and the EU were solvable, the hostile questions that followed from MPs showed just how hard it would be to get any deal through Parliament. Jeremy Corbyn’s attempts to say that the government’s ‘Groundhog Day’ Brexit plans would fail Labour’s six Brexit tests were met with laughter and derision. The Leader of the Opposition’s shouty performance gave the beleaguered Prime Minister little reason for worry. However, the questions from the backbenchers

Katy Balls

Crisis, what crisis? Theresa May keeps calm and carries on

With the government on the brink of a full blown crisis, there was speculation that Theresa May would use today’s Brexit statement to the House to turn her ire on Brussels. In the end it wasn’t to be and the Prime Minister adopted a conciliatory tone – praising both sides – as she did her best to insist that it was business as normal. After Dominic Raab’s fruitless trip to Brussels marked an impasse in the Brexit negotiations, the Prime Minister insisted that she did not believe the UK and the EU were actually so ‘far apart’ on the remaining issues. She told the House that with the negotiations had stalled over

Hell week 2.0: can Theresa May cling on?

If last week was ‘hell week’ for Theresa May, the next few days could be classed as the Prime Minister’s trip to the ninth circle. With problems over the Irish border backstop unsolved, No 10 are fighting fire on multiple fronts ahead of a crucial EU Council meeting on Wednesday. The papers are filled with Cabinet resignation threats, rumoured leadership bids and a warning from the DUP that ‘no deal’ is now the most likely outcome. The Sunday Times puts the number of no confidence letters with 1922 chair Graham Brady at 44 – if four more go in a confidence vote will follow. Should that come to be and

Are we heading for a Salzburg-style smash?

Sunday night was when the deal on the Irish backstop was meant to be done. But, as I say in The Sun this morning, this now seems unlikely to happen. The UK  and the EU are just too far apart on too many issues. There are two big issues at play. One, whether there should be a UK-wide backstop or one for Great Britain and another for Northern Ireland. I am told that at Thursday’s meeting of the inner Cabinet, ministers were told that the EU has not yet agreed to a UK-wide customs backstop. The second question is whether the backstop should be time limited. One member of the

DUP give new meaning to ‘hell week’

From the offset, this week was described as one that would be hellish for Theresa May. However, the DUP have given fresh meaning to ‘hell week’ after embarking on a PR offensive to make their displeasure at the government’s Irish backstop proposals known. Today the Prime Minister meets with a select number of Cabinet ministers (those seen as supportive) to update them on the Brexit talks – but the people she desperately needs to win over are Arlene Foster and Nigel Dodds. Foster and her colleagues have seen red after details have emerged of May’s backstop proposals. These proposals would see different regulatory systems for goods in Britain and Northern Ireland.

James Forsyth

How can Philip Hammond budget for Brexit?

Before every Budget, George Osborne would tell his aides to prepare for it as if it were their last. His thinking was that chancellors only have so many opportunities to tilt the country in the direction they want it to go. Osborne’s Budget record was far from perfect, but that mindset did at least mean that he achieved some lasting change. Philip Hammond is approaching this month’s Budget differently. Unlike Osborne or Gordon Brown, he is not a political strategist, and it shows. The Treasury is treating this month’s Budget like a holding exercise. To be fair to Hammond, one of the reasons the Treasury is taking such a cautious

Is World Mental Health Day just tokenist rubbish?

What is the point of a Minister for Suicide Prevention? That Jackie Doyle-Price is taking on the role as part of her portfolio as a health minister is one of the big government announcements on World Mental Health Day, but it’s tempting to ask why on earth Theresa May is making such appointments. Some might wonder whether government can really stop suicides, while others might question the difference that giving a minister an additional job title will really make. It’s the sort of question that you might reasonably ask about World Mental Health Day itself, as it happens. A fair number of people who have mental illnesses find the rather

Ending austerity won’t be as simple as May made it sound

It was the line in her conference speech that demonstrated Theresa May’s desire to stay on as Prime Minister after Brexit. But it was also the line that will cause her the most trouble. I say in The Sun this morning that May’s declaration that austerity is over will cause problems even if the Tories couldn’t have fought another election on austerity. First of all, they have already pledged to spend an extra £20 billion on the NHS. At the time, many senior Tories regarded this as the party making a choice to spend ‘the proceeds of growth’ on the health service. But by now announcing the end of austerity,

Diary – 4 October 2018

A weekend news report says Environment Secretary Michael Gove’s childhood has been scrutinised by colleagues ‘for clues to understanding this most paradoxical of politicians — the popular, ultra-courteous free-thinker who, by knifing Boris Johnson in the 2016 Tory leadership election, became a byword for treachery’. Gove was adopted as a baby and has never sought to meet his birth parents. He speaks fondly of the Aberdeen couple who adopted him. While the article concerned was generally favourable to Gove, the line about colleagues scrutinising his childhood jarred. It seemed to suggest childhood adoption might have inclined him to later-in-life treachery, as if that was the sad result of giving a

Isabel Hardman

Exclusive: Why the Tories feel so spooked by Jeremy Corbyn

One of the things that the Tory conference taught us was quite how worried the party is about Labour. There was almost a Mean Girls-style obsession with talking about Jeremy Corbyn in speeches on the stage, including Theresa May’s own address at the end of conference, where she returned to the problems with the Labour Party a number of times. The Tories are right to be worried, and not just as a result of last year’s snap election. I understand that the reason Labour has decided to talk so much about the way capitalism has left certain voters behind is that recent polling carried out by the party found it

Katy Balls

Donald Tusk rains on Theresa May’s post-conference parade

After a better-than-expected conference speech, Theresa May has given her premiership a much needed boost. Only it seems not everyone wants her turn in fortune to continue. This afternoon, Donald Tusk took to social media, following a press conference with the Taoiseach, to bring the Prime Minister back down to earth with a an unhelpful tweet about the Brexit negotiations. Adopting the words of Brexiteers including David Davis, the EU council leader said Brussels has always been happy to offer a ‘Canada+++ deal’ and that this offer was ‘a true measure of respect’: From the very beginning, the EU offer has been a Canada+++ deal. Much further-reaching on trade, internal security