Friday afternoon prediction: May could quit next Wednesday morning (and yes, I’m sober!)
I’m going to go off my normal rational path and go for a mad Friday afternoon prediction: May could quit next week, probably on Wednesday morning.
No, I’ve not been on Stellas, there is some method in this…
Core Assumption: May’s botched deal gets voted down big time on Tuesday, predictions including the BBC say she could lose by over 200 votes. If that happens she’s broken as Prime Minister. Convention before the Fixed Term Act would have meant a general election straight away.
But because of the Fixed Term Act she doesn’t have to go. Also because of Ress-Mogg’s badly timed leadership challenge the Tory party can’t get rid of her until next Xmas. So why do I say she will go?
- She can’t govern anymore. The defeat would let all kinds of genies out of the bag, she won’t be able to assume a majority for anything.
- A massive ‘what happens next’ crisis will unfold. She’s has no plan B and after a defeat her Cabinet and the Tory party will fall apart.
- The deal that she made to win the leadership challenge was to say she will go before the next election. That much is public, my guess is that behind the scenes she or senior Tories also made it clear she’d go if there was a massive defeat on her deal.
- Contrary to the media myth, the Cabinet aren’t all focused on Brexit. The key players have all been out on manoeuvres, eg Rudd, Hunt, Gove, the heating salesman etc.They would be so blatant if they didn’t think May going was on the cards.
In short, the country, Parliament and the Tory would all be stuck if she stays. Senior Tories will fear this would make a successful Vote of No Confidence from Labour more likely. That and the “what happens next crisis” will make them squeeze May out.
If she does go, there won’t be a Tory leadership election. There will be backroom Tory negotiations to pick an interim leader to manage the next steps, the chief one being to work out what next, more openly and collaboratively than May did, eg indicative votes in the Commons.
The peace deal for the Tory factions will be the new leader asks for a delay on Article 50, works out what the Commons wants and then either goes back to the EU with that or use as the basis for a snap Tory leadership contest. Because no leadership candidate wants to pick up the current mess and would not want a leadership election before Brexit is resolved or the interim PM narrows things down to an ‘A’ or ‘B’ choice and Tory candidates then stand on that basis.
This is why I believe it’s right to push for a General Election at a right time after May’s defeat. What happens next to the country and who the next Prime Minister is can’t be a choice purely for the Tory party to make, especially given their ‘decision making’ track record.
Ok, so this is all a bit of Friday afternoon mind wander stuff and has a low but not zero degree of probability of happening. Certainly stranger things have happened. Watch out for the signs though, you never know…
The original tweet in which this was posted as a Thread:
