May on way out after breaking red lines, says IDS
Former Tory leader says Prime Minister’s days ‘are numbered’ if reports on Brexit deal are confirmed
Chief Political Correspondent
THERESA MAY’S days “are numbered”, Iain Duncan Smith said last night, amid a furious backlash from Brexiteer Tory MPS over the Prime Minister’s draft Brexit deal.
The former Tory leader and a dozen Eurosceptic MPS convened a hurried press conference in Parliament after reports of the deal emerged in the Irish press. Mr Duncan Smith said if the reports proved to be correct Mrs May had “broken her own red lines”.
Boris Johnson, the former foreign secretary, described the deal as “vassal state stuff” and “utterly unacceptable to anyone who believes in democracy”.
The DUP also expressed fury. Nigel Dodds, the party’s Westminster leader, said the deal was “a trap” and it was unacceptable for Northern Ireland to be tied to EU regulation over farming produce and industrial goods.
He said: “That is the regulatory piece. We object to that on constitutional grounds. Our laws will be made in Brussels – not in Westminster or Belfast. That is the fundamental red line.”
The union, too, seems under threat, with SNP leaders almost certain to demand the same partial regulation in Scotland as is reportedly planned for Northern Ireland.
Asked by The Daily Telegraph “if the Government’s days are numbered” because of the deal, Mr Duncan Smith said: “If this is the case, the answer is almost certainly ‘yes’.
“The Government will have put itself in an impossible position, because they are trying to promote something which they themselves said they would never promote. How can you ask the party to vote [for] something which you yourself as Prime Minister and the Cabinet said they would never allow.”
Asked if it were now time for a new party leader, Mr Duncan Smith said: “The questions will be asked … the party will certainly be asking questions along those lines.” But he questioned the “spine” of Brexit-supporting Cabinet ministers who he said would probably not quit.
He said: “I never expect anything. As Mrs Thatcher once said to a friend of mine – but it may apply to the Cabinet – ‘your spine does not yet meet your brain’.”
His comments were echoed by Mr Johnson, who said: “We are going to stay in the customs union. We are going to stay effectively in large parts of the single market. It is vassal state stuff.
“For the first time in 1,000 years this place, this Parliament, will not have a say over the laws that govern this country. A quite incredible state of affairs.
“It will mean that we are having to accept rules and regulations from Brussels over which we have no say ourselves. It is utterly unacceptable to anyone who believes in democracy. It is not the right way forward.”
One former Brexiteer Cabinet minister, who asked not to be named, said the deal meant the Tories could not win the election.
The MP said: “We are all toast aren’t we? This is almost like the Titanic – she can’t steer it and she is not going to let anyone else steer it. Normally rats leave a sinking ship – this lot have stayed on it.”
Another Tory MP simply said: “We’re going to hell.”
Mark Francois MP, deputy chairman of the European Research Group (ERG), openly challenged Cabinet ministers to resign over the deal.
Mr Francois said: “What members of the Cabinet do over the next 24 hours is the most important thing that they do in their lives.
“They have an opportunity to stand up for their country and defend its destiny. We very much hope that they will take it.”
Jacob Rees-mogg, the chairman of the ERG, said: “The white flags have gone up all over Whitehall.”
Minutes after the impromptu press conference in Parliament’s central lobby, around 50 members of the ERG met in a committee room upstairs, where DUP MPS vented their fury at the deal.
One ERG source said: “There was total unanimity. Jacob said, ‘We just can’t do this, it is not the manifesto we