May’s last gamble...

THERESA May has campaigned like this before, and it didn’t end well. She is adopting the same approach she took in her disastrous 2017 general election – an unwarranted, yet unyielding, confidence.

That vote saw the Prime Minister lose 13 Tory MPs, and her majority in the Commons.

But, despite the catastrophic result of last year’s election, she is going into the Parliamentary discussions on her draft Brexit plan with a similarly unjustified “absolute certainty”.

Even a leader as bad at reading the room as Mrs May must recognise that she needs to quickly convert her many opponents – on both sides of the house – if she has any chance of persuading MPs to endorse her deal.

It won’t be easy – indeed, it may be impossible – and the Brexit debates over the next two weeks could be some of the most bitter and partisan since the 2016 referendum.

But now is the time for MPs who don’t share Mrs May’s unshakeable certainty to speak up. The outcome of this will affect us all.