MAY ENDS IN JUNE
She’s in tears as MPs force her to go next month Country in tears as Boris leads race for the job
THERESA May was left in tears yesterday after being forced to announce a date to finally quit.
But it opened the dreaded prospect of Boris Johnson becoming PM as he last night led the race to replace her.
Mrs May agreed to leave at a Tory meeting after being allowed a last vote on her Brexit deal in June.
Asked if he would run, Mr Johnson said: “I’m going to go for it. Of course.”
AFTER yet more ministers quit over Brexit last year, Theresa May gave an insight into her stubbornness.
“One of my heroes was always Geoffrey Boycott,” she told reporters.
“And what did you know about Geoffrey Boycott? He stuck to it and got the runs in the end.”
Mrs May has stayed at No 10 when others would have walked – or been forced out. She oversaw the disastrous general election campaign where the Tories lost their majority.
She then suffered the heaviest parliamentary defeat in modern history in the first Brexit vote.
Her flagship policy – her deal to leave the EU – went on to be defeated twice more. The Tory Government has virtually ground to a halt with no votes on legislation since April 10.
Fifty ministers have left their roles over her two years in power.
She lost 1,300 Tory councillors at the local elections – with catastrophe expected in next week’s Euro vote.
Not even her most loyal ministers think that she can get her Brexit bill through. Yet through it all – until yesterday – the PM has endured.
While she fought for one last shot at getting her Brexit plan through, she also had a tougher deadline.
On June 15 Tory members are gathering to pass a no-confidence vote in Mrs May’s leadership.
Her closest political allies admit that she could not bear the humiliation of losing. Like Boycott before her, she was a poor captain, and ultimately that was her downfall. THERESA May’s smiling face as she drove to a meeting with Tory MPs yesterday soon turned to thunder after backbenchers demanded she finally quit amid the Brexit chaos.
The emotional showdown left the PM visibly upset, but as she wrestled with her emotions, up stepped ambitious Boris Johnson to announce he was ready to jump into her shoes.
And last night, the blundering former Foreign Secretary was leading the race among Tory rivals to replace her.
Mr Johnson, whose career has been peppered with a string of embarrassing gaffes and fibs, said: “I’m going to go for it, of course I’m going to go for it.”
Allies insisted the crass timing of his announcement was a coincidence. Several Tories have said they will quit the party if Mr Johnson becomes PM.
Mrs May’s imminent departure has echoes of Margaret Thatcher’s decision to stand down in 1990, after discussions with the chairman of the 1922 Committee convinced her that it was time to go.
She was later was pictured in tears being driven away from Downing Street for the last time, to the nation’s relief.
One source in the room during yesterday’s “frank” 90-minute showdown described Mrs May as “very teary”.
Though one source in the room denied Mrs May cried or had a tear in her eye, instead claiming she was “stoic”.
She had been forced to agree to set an exit day in her meeting. But she was granted three weeks to again try to pass her doomed Withdrawal Agreement Bill in the week ending June 3 after they accepted a plea from her.
Cabinet ministers and the Tory Whip’s Office believe her Brexit plans have virtually zero chance of passing.
It means defeat would trigger her resignation and a leadership contest before the summer break.
Allies believe she wants to go before a humiliating no-confidence vote among Tory members the following week. One minister said: “She’ll go after the Withdrawal Bill falls and before the grassroots call for her to.” Labour has said it will vote against the EU deal unless it changes dramatically while the hardline DUP and Tory Brexiteers are against it.
One No 10 insider warned Mrs May was still at least 80 MPs short to pass the
Good news: May is ordered to quit at last
Bad news: We could get Boris in No10
legislation, adding: “If the Bill falls, everyone knows what comes after that. It’s the last act of this government.”
Tory backbench chief Sir Graham Brady said: “We have agreed to meet to decide the timetable for the election of a new leader of the party as soon as the second reading has occurred and that will take place regardless of what the vote is on the second reading, whether it passes or whether it fails.” But one supporter of the PM told how she warned MPs if the Bill was defeated there would be no Brexit. Before the meeting in the PM’s Commons office, MP Geoffrey Clifton-Brown said it would be “much more dignified” for Mrs May to name a date to quit.
Her former chief of staff, Nick Timothy, said it was “beyond time for the PM to accept that the game is up”. There was pressure for the contest to take place before the summer so the new PM could hit the ground running.
But with such a wide field it could take months, with a leader announced at party conference this autumn.
More than a dozen MPs are expected to go for the job, with Esther McVey, Andrea Leadsom and Rory Stewart all
NO 10 INSIDER ON MOVES AFTER MRS MAY’S BREXIT
already in the running. Big hitters Jeremy Hunt, Michael Gove and Sajid Javid are also expected to compete.
Mr Johnson is understood to be pressing Tory MPs with small majorities in marginal seats to back him. He believes he is the only one who can rescue seats vulnerable to Labour or Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party.
Home Secretary Mr Javid took a thinly veiled swipe at Mr Johnson, who once said “f*** business” when told of companies’ fears over a hard Brexit.
He said: “It is right that we as the Conservative Party do more to reclaim our position as the party of business, but especially the party of small business.”
Claims Mrs May could stay and enter more talks with the EU were dismissed.
One source said: “She doesn’t want to go to Brussels again… ever.”
If the Bill fails, everyone knows what comes. It’s the last act of this government