Matthew GOODWIN

Aperfect storm is approaching Theresa May’s Conservative Party. There is no law that political parties must last forever. Today, the clouds above Britain’s most successful party are visible to all: the Government’s disastrous handling of Brexit, a deeply split Cabinet, a parliamentary party that has fractured, a Conservative electorate and membership that are at loggerheads with their leaders, a rebooted and well-funded populist Right under Nigel Farage and a fundamentally damaged Conservative brand. At no other point in Britain’s post-war period has the Conservative Party looked so vulnerable.

Worse, two decisions in the past week have added to the looming storm. Mrs May’s decision to invite Jeremy Corbyn into the heart of the Brexit negotiations sits uneasily with the fact that most Conservatives loathe all that Corbyn represents. The super-soft “Mr Whippy” vision of Brexit that Labour advocates is, in the eyes of most Conservative voters, indistinguishable from remaining in the EU. The promise of Brexit, of forging a radical new settlement, now risks being diluted into a weaker version of the status quo.

Meanwhile, the polls show that an overwhelming majority of Conservative voters back the one thing MPS this week ruled out: a no-deal Brexit. If the Conservative leadership had no serious intention of preparing for no deal then it should have said so at the outset. Instead, the Prime Minister and her advisers have pursued an approach that will now be used in university courses on international relations as a textbook case of how not to negotiate.

Ever since the 2017 general election, the leadership has looked completely adrift from its supporters. When asked what should happen if Britain has not agreed a deal by April 12, 72 per cent of Conservative voters today say Britain should leave the EU without a deal Fewer than one in 10 think Britain should seek a further extension, the avenue Mrs May wants to pursue.

Similarly, if you take the idea of an extension off the table and ask them to choose between leaving the EU without a deal or withdrawing our application to leave and remaining in the EU, 76 per cent of Conservatives say leave with no deal. Through the eyes of the average Leaver, Britain took a political decision to leave and should have had the political strategy and leadership to accept the associated risks. Future historians will not look kindly upon the current leadership.

These numbers reflect a profound disconnect between people who vote Conservative and those who lead it. The vote for Brexit marked the first time in British political history when a majority outside Parliament formally asked for something a majority inside did not support. It was always destined to bring us to a political and even a constitutional crisis. And while most Conservative voters sought a meaningful break from the EU or, if this was not possible, walking away with no deal, many in Government sought to whittle Brexit down to something far from the radical project it always supposed to be.

The party is swimming in perilous waters. What those around Mrs May seem to have forgotten is that the party’s electorate today is profoundly different from the party’s electorate of yesterday. People who stand behind Mrs May are far more pro-brexit than those who stood behind Mr Cameron. Ask Conservative voters how they would vote at a second referendum and 70 per cent say Leave. Ask them if they think, in hindsight, Britain was right or wrong to vote for Brexit and more than two-thirds say “right”.

I remember sitting in Downing Street listening to one of Mrs May’s close advisers tell me enthusiastically about how the party should focus not on Britain’s Leavers but on winning back 18 to 24-year-olds, middle-class Remainers and seats in London. I was shocked. It was a major misreading of where we are and how Brexit has cut through our politics, shaken up tribal loyalties and ensured that the next general election, whenever it is held, will be defined by this issue. Conservatives face both a short and long-term dilemma. In the short term, they simply have no hope of winning back groups like students in the Labour seat of Canterbury, or London seats like Croydon Central. University towns are gone. London is gone. Middle-class Remainia is fuming at how Mrs May has handled Brexit, and while most Remain voters are dubious about Corbyn they agree with him on economics. In the long term, they could be won back, but with a new and radical domestic policy agenda – and a new leader.

This is why the Conservative Party cannot afford to alienate its core pro-brexit voters. To do so risks total annihilation. This is the perfect storm; a party that chases after voters who are not yet ready to talk while at the same time failing to sustain the loyalty of its pro-brexit core. I walked out of Downing Street concluding that Mrs May has been given terrible advice.

Ordinarily, this might not matter but today the Conservative Party faces three competitors for these votes: Nigel Farage’s new Brexit Party; the decidedly more Right-wing Ukip; and, perhaps most important of all, apathy.

All Labour needs to rule Britain as part of a coalition is a two-point uniform swing. An equally plausible four-point swing would give Corbyn a majority in his own right. So hand Farage, Ukip or apathy a few points and it’s game over for the Conservative Party. This is already having consequences. Brexit has dealt a hammer blow to the Conservative Party’s image as a one of competence. Ask Conservatives today whether their Government is handling Brexit well or badly and nearly three-quarters will say “badly”.

And now, for the first time, the number of Conservative voters who want Mrs May to stand down outnumber those who want her to stay. Mrs May already looks set to go down in history as the fourth Conservative Prime Minister to be brought down by the Europe question, after Thatcher, Major and Cameron.

The question now is what happens to the party that she leaves behind? It is hard to be optimistic on that front.

Matthew Goodwin is the author of ‘National Populism: The Revolt Against Liberal Democracy’

‘Hand Farage, Ukip or apathy a few points and it’s game over for the Conservative Party’