Theresa’s prime aim is a mission too far

Dangling on thread over Brexit MPs have new Commons ID passes with photos on both sides. Tory Andrew Bridgen said: We’re now officially two-faced.”

THERESA May and Tom Cruise make an odd couple but they have more in common than their attempts at Mission: Impossible.

Both do their own stunts against expert advice. Cruise has just broken an ankle jumping from one building to another on the set of Mission: Impossible 6.

That kind of derring-do was fine 20 years ago when the movie series began, but not now Cruise is a creaking 55-year-old.

Mrs May’s first Mission: Impossible was her snap General Election.

Her second stunt was making herself the centre of it, her third the election manifesto, her fourth dodging TV debates, her fifth snubbing Grenfell fire victims.

Squeeze

The result of Cruise’s stunt backfiring was to halt filming for 12 weeks, which will infuriate Hollywood moneymen.

In Mrs May’s case it was to lose her majority, which infuriated her MPs.

Still, all might have been well had Mrs May not launched Mission: Impossible 6 – announcing that she would remain PM for a full five years.

Tory MPs think that’s as laughable as Cruise trying to enforce a five-year no public dating clause on his ex Katie Holmes in their divorce settlement.

Now the time’s up she has appeared hand-in-hand on a Malibu beach with her new squeeze, the Oscarwinning actor Jamie Foxx.

You’ll remember that it was my story saying Mrs May was expected to quit on Friday, August 30, 2019 after Brexit is finalised that prompted her to make such a perilous Cruise-like leap.

Tory MPs say my date for her departure still stands, and they’re now more determined than ever she will never lead them into another election.

Mrs May’s best hope at her Manchester party conference next month is to show the same humility she originally did to MPs, not bang on about serving five years and promise to avoid any more stupid stunts. She can still be a woman on a mission but must show she’s no longer an impossible woman.

Because in the unlikely event she makes a success of Brexit she could yet redeem herself and Tory MPs might keep her on.

It’s a long shot. But more Mission: Improbable than Mission: Impossible.