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Courtesy of the Sunday Times.
Theresa May was at the mercy of a full-blown cabinet coup last night as senior ministers moved to oust the prime minister and replace her with her deputy, David Lidington. In a frantic series of private telephone calls, senior ministers agreed the prime minister must announce she is standing down, warning that she has become a toxic and “erratic” figure whose judgment has “gone haywire”.
As up to 1m people marched on the streets of London against Brexit yesterday, May’s fate was being decided elsewhere.
The Sunday Times spoke to 11 cabinet ministers who confirmed that they wanted the prime minister to make way for someone else. The plotters plan to confront May at a cabinet meeting tomorrow and demand that she announces she is quitting. If she refuses, they will threaten mass resignations or publicly demand her head. Last night, the conspirators were locked in talks to try to reach a consensus deal on a new prime minister so there does not have to be a protracted leadership contest.
At least six ministers are supportive of installing Lidington, the de facto deputy prime minister, as a caretaker in No 10 to deliver Brexit and then make way for a full leadership contest in the autumn.
Lidington’s supporters include cabinet remainers Greg Clark, Amber Rudd and David Gauke. The chancellor, Philip Hammond, also believes Lidington should take over if May refuses this week to seek a new consensus deal on Brexit.
Crucially, the home secretary, Sajid Javid, has agreed to put his own leadership ambitions on hold until the autumn to clear the way for Lidington — as long as his main rivals do the same. Lidington is understood not to be pressing for the top job but is prepared to take over if that is the will of cabinet. He would agree not to stand in the contest to find a permanent leader. A cabinet source said: “David’s job would be to secure an extension with the EU, find a consensus for a new Brexit policy and then arrange an orderly transition to a new leader.” However, others called for Michael Gove or Jeremy Hunt to take charge instead. Hunt, the foreign secretary, does not support Lidington because he believes he would do a deal with Labour to take Britain into a permanent customs union with the EU, although he has lost confidence in May’s ability to take advice or deliver the deal.
Lidington’s friends want him to pledge to allow the cabinet to decide Brexit policy in order to get Hunt and Gove on board, urging the three cabinet heavyweights to work together to take control of the government.
Gove, the environment secretary, has a leadership team in place and a raft of supporters who have been recruited in a series of secret dinners hosted by Mel Stride, the Treasury minister. Gove is prepared to support Lidington if others do but is sceptical that agreement will be reached. The coup erupted after a week of mistakes by May, who delivered a television statement that alienated the MPs whose support she needs for her Brexit deal and then flirted with backing a no deal before performing a U-turn. One cabinet minister said: “The end is nigh. She won’t be prime minister in 10 days’ time.” A second said: “Her judgment has started to go haywire. You can’t be a member of the cabinet who just puts your head in the sand.” George Freeman, the Conservative MP and Mrs May’s former policy adviser, warned that it was “all over for the PM.” “She’s done her best. But across the country you can see the anger,” he wrote on Twitter. “Everyone feels betrayed. Government’s gridlocked. Trust in democracy is collapsing. This can’t go on. We need a new PM who can reach out and build some sort of coalition for a Plan B.”
While Nicky Morgan, the former education secretary, wrote in The Sunday Telegraph that “it’s time to go,” and Conservative MP Anne-Marie Trevelyan said “we now need a leader who believes in our country”. Concerns about May’s mental and physical resilience are widely shared. Officials in parliament were so concerned about May’s welfare they drew up a protocol to extract her from the Commons if she collapsed at the dispatch box.