Brexiteer is slapped down over PM attack

A HARDLINE Brexiteer was slapped down last night after calling for a vote of confidence in Theresa May.

Mark Francois’s demand was quickly rejected by Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 Committee of backbench Tory MPs.

It came as former party chairman Chris Patten warned that Brexit has turned the Tories into a ‘jihadist’ party obsessed with ideology.

His intervention came as Mr Francois, deputy chairman of the European Research Group, sent a letter to Sir Graham calling for Mrs May to go. In it, he said he believed the PM should resign for the sake of ‘the existential future of our party and the destiny of our country’.

If she would not, he called for an indicative confidence vote in her leadership. He said: ‘I believe Theresa May has been a failure as leader of our party, which she now threatens to destroy.

‘Hers is a classic example of hubris – and after hubris comes nemesis.’ He said it was ‘literally incredible’ that Mrs May was discussing a possible compromise Brexit deal with Jeremy Corbyn. ‘We are living in a world gone mad,’ he added. ‘A Conservative Prime Minister, who voted Remain, egged on by a coterie of neo-federalist civil servants and a powerful Remainiac cabal in the Cabinet, has tried – and failed three times – to pass a draft treaty through the Commons which would lock us into a customs union forever.’

Sir Graham said the 1922 Committee had no intention of agreeing to Mr Francois’s proposal. ‘There is no intention of proceeding,’ he said.

Other Tory backbenchers reportedly told Mrs May that she is now ‘the problem’ and demanded she stand down. Members of the 1922 Committee met Mrs May in Downing Street and told her that party supporters had turned against her over the weekend.

The Daily Telegraph claimed Mrs May received the MPs in silence and would not discuss her future when the backbenchers said she was causing ‘damage’ to the party.