TORY Brexiteers called on Theresa May to resign over the latest delay to Brexit.
The Prime Minister’s willingness to accept a six-month extension to the Article 50 negotiations has infuriated those who believe the UK would flourish if the country crashed out of Europe with no deal.
In one dramatic moment in the Commons yesterday, Tory MP Sir Bill Cash, chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee, asked May to account for her “abject surrender” in Brussels, and to resign.
He said: “Does the Prime Minister appreciate the anger that her abject surrender last night has generated across the country, having broken promises 100 times not to extend the time?”
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Cash asked if May accepted that her Brexit deal “undermines our democracy, the constitutional status of Northern Ireland, the right to govern ourselves, control over our laws, and undermines our national interest?”, adding: “Will she resign?”
But May, who has already promised to go once this stage of Brexit negotiations is over, shot back: “I think you know the answer to that.”
Many Tories fear the consequences of the delay in both next month’s European elections, and in the local elections in England.
Former Tory Brexit minister Steve Baker asked if May would be swapping the DUP MPs who prop up her minority government with Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party.
May replied: “I recognise that in this House reaching across the divide between the Government and the opposition frontbenches to attempt to come to an agreement on a matter is not usual practice, it is probably virtually unprecedented in the conditions in which we’re doing it today. But I believe it is in the national interest for this House to deliver on the result of the referendum, for this House to deliver Brexit for the British people, and to do so in an orderly way.”
Fellow Brexiteer Marc Francois said “Perseverance is a virtue, but sheer obstinacy is not”, though the comment saw MPs laugh at him rather than with him.
There was some support for May from her own benches. Remain-backing Tory grandee Ken Clarke called on her to “stick to her commitment” to stay on through the EU divorce talks, and urged her to “ignore some of the vicious attacks being made upon her by her more extreme right-wing colleagues”.
Earlier in the day, former Brexit secretary David Davis said May’s lack of progress would only add to the pressure on her.
There were reports that the Brexiteers were plotting to remove May sooner rather than later, though it’s not entirely clear how. The Prime Minister survived a Tory party confidence vote in December last year meaning she can’t be challenged until December this year.
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