Let’s face it, she will keep going until the end of time
Theresa May is immortal. It’s the only rational explanation. No matter what disaster befalls her, she just powers on, unscathed, undaunted, and seemingly oblivious.
She simply cannot be stopped. She’ll outlast Thatcher and Gladstone. She’ll outlast human civilisation. Climate change will pass her by. Asteroids will bounce off her. The ray guns of alien invaders will self-combust in her presence. And when, seven billion years from now, the sun expands to devour the Earth, it will get to within 50 yards of Downing Street – and then, on hearing her inimitable, grey, resistance-crushing drone, it will shrink back in alarm, and flee.
There’s no point trying to fight it. Let’s face facts: Theresa May is going to remain Prime Minister until the end of time. And very likely beyond.
At 3am yesterday, Mrs May was giving a press conference in Brussels. Mere hours later, she was making a statement in the Commons about the latest delay to Brexit, and answering questions from more than 80 MPS. Yet unlike everyone else in the chamber, she didn’t look or sound remotely tired. It was frankly unsettling.
Put it like this. Sir Bill Cash (Con, Stone) accused her of “abject surrender to the EU”, and, quivering
Mrs May, unlike everyone else in the chamber, didn’t look or sound remotely tired. It was frankly unsettling
with anger, asked whether she would now resign. In response, however, Mrs May did not scowl, or stammer, or snap. She smiled. She actually smiled.
“I think you know the answer to that,” she replied pleasantly – as if, rather than howling for her head, Sir Bill had offered a cup of tea and a bun.
It didn’t matter what anyone said. Peter Bone (Con, Wellingborough) demanded she “honour her commitment” to quit rather than delay Brexit beyond June 30. Mark Francois (Con, Rayleigh & Wickford) deplored her “sheer obstinacy”. Steve Baker (Con, Wycombe) asked sardonically whether she was planning to abandon her confidence-and-supply deal with the DUP for one with Labour. But none of it seemed to trouble her at all. They might as well have been throwing paper darts at a Chieftain tank.
Several leapt to her defence, not that she appeared to need it. Ken Clarke (Con, Rushcliffe) told her to disregard “our more extreme Rightwing colleagues”. Sarah Newton (Con, Truro & Falmouth) told her to “ignore the bullies on our back benches”. Various Labour MPS, meanwhile, thanked Mrs May for avoiding a no-deal Brexit, and thus “putting the national interest before party interest”.
And also, of course, for giving them a holiday. An exhausted Commons is now taking next week off.
Chris Bryant (Lab, Rhondda) sounded relieved. “I thought we would get to Easter Sunday,” he said, “and the good Lord would rise before this House did.”
MPS will return to work on April 23 – at which point, refreshed and revitalised, they can begin repeating the exact arguments about Brexit they’ve been having for the past two years, word for word. I can’t wait.