Reckless rebels risk destroying their party

IN a sane world, Wednesday’s decisive win for Theresa May should have earned her – at the very least – a bit of breathing space.

Having seen off the botched coup, and knowing her enemies couldn’t move against her for another year, she could have set off for Brussels yesterday – where she hopes to win concessions on the Northern Ireland backstop – with the wind in her sails.

If they were behaving responsibly, her opponents would have accepted defeat and stopped the endless plotting which has taken their party to the brink of civil war. They might even have been gracious about her decision to stand down as leader before the next election – news many voters will have received with considerable regret.

But these are far from normal times in the Westminster madhouse. Instead, rebel Eurosceptics barely waited for the result before returning to the fray.

Bizarrely, Jacob Rees-Mogg – whose Wodehousian charm evaporated long ago – immediately insisted Mrs May had a constitutional duty to quit. No, she doesn’t. Meanwhile, ambitious ex-minister Dominic Raab questioned how she could continue. What don’t they get about losing?

These hardliners are vociferous in pointing to the 52 per cent Leave vote in the referendum to justify their demands for a damaging no-deal Brexit. It is inconsistent, to say the least, to refuse to accept the result of the confidence vote which Mrs May won with 63 per cent – a far more significant margin. Indeed, what the outcome shows is that the malcontents aren’t even close to convincing fellow MPs of the merits of their reckless approach.

Their plan, cooked up in what some rebels tastelessly described as a ‘kill room’, was to remove Mrs May, install either Mr Raab, or Boris Johnson as Tory leader, and then drive the country off a no-deal cliff edge. After this week, this plot is in ruins, and their options have narrowed sharply.

They can accept Mrs May’s deal which, for all its imperfections, guarantees the UK leaves the European Union in little over 100 days. Or they can vote against, and take their chances on what a Parliament dominated by Remainers will do if it wrestles control of the Brexit process.

The Mail hopes they will see sense and rally behind the Prime Minister, instead of destroying their party, imperilling Brexit, and – by opening the door to Jeremy Corbyn – causing incalculable damage to the country.