THE MAY SUPREMACY

CATCH IT NOW (IT COULD BE OVER SOONER THAN YOU THINK)

THERE was a moment during Wednesday’s No 10 reception when the famous Pillared Room started to resemble one of the state rooms on the Titanic. As Theresa May entered, the assembled guests began to gravitate subtly (or so we thought) towards her side of the room. David Cameron used to circulate gracefully, pausing at a series of pre-selected meeting points. But our new Prime Minister wasn’t moving for anyone. To catch a word with her, you needed to get in line.

Understandably. These are the days of the May Supremacy. The mood of national crisis that followed the Brexit vote seemed to subside the moment she crossed the threshold of Downing Street. She has successfully managed a seamless, if bloody, transition of government.

A poll published on Wednesday saw her party opening up a 16point lead over Labour, enough to increase the Conservative’s majority from 12 seats to more than 100. Leaving her master – or mistress – of all she surveys.

Her opponents look on with a mixture of despondency and admiration. ‘She’s finished us,’ said one Labour MP. ‘ Just l ook at her. She was born to be Prime Minister. The next Election is going to be a massacre.’

Possibly. But incredible as it might seem, the next Election is not a foregone conclusion.

Despite everything – the skill and speed of May’s ascendency, Labour’s continuing self-immolation, the cold logic of the electoral arithmetic – there is still a way for the Conservatives to lose in 2020.

All it requires is a strange confluence of events. Actually a strange confluence of three specific events. One is unlikely, the second is highly likely, the third is possible. Admittedly, the chances of all three aligning are improbable. But as we have seen, in British politics the improbable is now conceivable.

FOR Theresa May to lose an election in 2020, the first thing that would have to happen is for Labour to call a halt to its death march. And as we have seen, there is currently little prospect of that.

Speak to any Labour moderate, and they will construct a solid case for how Owen Smith can defeat Jeremy Corbyn. They will explain how Corbyn’s London base has crumbled following his exposure as Nigel Farage’s sleeper agent during the Brexit campaign. They will reveal the witch-finders at Labour HQ are busily purging thousands of militant fifth columnists from the membership rolls. They point expectantly to the upcoming hustings, where they claim their man will smash Corbyn back on to the heels of his battered brown brogues.

Then you look into their eyes and the truth is revealed. Smith can put up a brave fight, not a victorious one.

But look closely, and you detect something else. A bloody-minded determination to keep going till the bitter end.

‘If Corbyn wins we’ll just do it again in the New Year,’ one rebel told me. ‘We’ll keep going, keep wearing him down. In the end he’ll crack.’ So let us say, for the sake of argument, that he does. That at some point in the next four years Labour’s moderates emerge from their war of attrition triumphant. Their party throws off the madness.

At that point, one of the three pillars sustaining Tory hopes for 2020 is removed.

The second pillar is the state of the British economy. And it is already swaying.

All the economic forecasts point to rapidly decelerating growth. The majority point to a post-Brexit recession. Last week saw consumer confidence plunge to its lowest level in a quarter of a century. Betterthan-anticipated growth figures for the last quarter before Brexit represent George Osborne’s way of giving the bird to his critics in the Leave campaign – and Downing Street.

Theresa May’s current favourability ratings – showing even millions of Labour voters rate her the most suitable Prime Minister – reflect voters’ sense that she represents a calm head in a crisis.

But for that perception to be sustained, she cannot afford to be seen to precipitate a crisis – especially an economic one.

For all May’s sure-footedness over the past few weeks, there is a fundamental question overshadowing her premiership that she has yet to effectively address. She has said Brexit must mean Brexit. She also said free movement must end. But she has also said Britain must try to remain within the single market. These statements represent a circle that cannot be squared. Britain’s EU partners have made it clear free movement remains a prerequisite for single market admission.

And even if she and her three Brexiteers – Boris Johnson, David Davis and Liam Fox – could secure concessions in this area, her Eurosceptic fundamentalists have warned they would reject them.

Brexit doesn’t just mean Brexit. A Brexit strategy that involves single-market withdrawal also means recession. And Theresa May will not be able to lay the blame for that recession at Labour’s door.

The final pillar supporting Theresa May’s electoral chances is actually buttressed by Theresa May herself.

If she were to call a snap election – at any point up until the summer of next year – victory would be assured. It would require some nimble parliamentary footwork to circumnavigate the Fixed-term Parliaments Act, but with Labour still in disarray, and the economic storm clouds merely scarring the horizon, the only question would be the size of her majority.

BUT for some reason Theresa May appears to be hesitating. Even more strangely, she seems to be actively closing down her options. Talk to aides and supporters and the line is the same. A snap election would be too opportunistic. Theresa May does not play these sorts of political games. She is in it for the long haul.

Which is admirable, but potentially self-defeating. Because time is not on her side. The questions surrounding the practicalities of Brexit will become harder, not easier, to answer. The economic consequences will start to make themselves felt. The window of opportunity for calling an election at a time of optimum advantage will shut. And the chances of Labour getting its act together – inconceivable though it may seem at the moment – will increase.

These are the days of the May Supremacy. She should enjoy them. Because in an age where the politically improbable has become possible, there is no guarantee that they will last.