Theresa May's 'Brextremists' think that a dose of Corbyn might be worth it for a hard Brexit – prepare for a bloodbath

The Tories are in disarray and it’s now time May revealed what she actually stands for

The PM is unlikely to lead her party into the next election (Reuters)

When Theresa May became Prime Minister a year ago, she reassured ministers she wanted to restore proper cabinet government – a dig at the “sofa government” of Tony Blair and David Cameron in which big decisions were sometimes taken in small informal groups.

In practice, the opposite happened. Although there were more discussions in cabinet committees, her enforcers Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill ruled ministers with a rod of iron. “We weren’t allowed out without permission,” one minister said. “Three people on the sofa called the shots.”

Ministers took revenge by forcing May to fire her two close aides after her election debacle. They also exploited her weakness, and a vacuum in No 10, to flex their little-used muscles.

But the Cabinet swung from Stalinist control-freakery to anarchy overnight as ministers and their allies briefed against their rivals – whether over Brexit, public sector pay or to get ahead in the race to succeed a Prime Minister who everyone knows will not lead her party into another election.

Philip Hammond, the Chancellor, was a man more briefed against than briefing – as he said on Sunday, he is a target because some cabinet colleagues do not like his attempt to protect the economy, jobs and living standards in the Brexit talks. His rather clumsy words at last week’s cabinet meeting on public sector pay and female train drivers were twisted and leaked to damage him. Parallel claims from an anonymous cabinet minister that Hammond is trying to “f*** up” Brexit gave the game away.

A weakened May tried to show she has some authority left by reading the riot act at the Cabinet’s final session before the summer break. Her anger over unauthorised leaks, and her call for strength and unity to start “around the cabinet table” was inevitably briefed out in advance by her aides – an authorised cabinet leak. It seems that only Damian Green, her loyal unofficial deputy, weighed in behind her, while other ministers kept their heads down.

The truce won’t last long. Because the fundamental cause of the Cabinet’s tensions – the Government’s policy on Brexit – is unresolved. Hammond, and a re-energised Treasury in Whitehall’s power battles since the election, are trying to steer May away from her hard Brexit by having a customs union and a transitional period of a few years to minimise disruption when the UK leaves the European Union in 2019. Hammond is not trying to “f*** up” Brexit, merely to limit the economic damage (and, as he tells fellow ministers, the ensuing damage to the Conservatives’ election prospects).

But the Chancellor is at odds with Brexiteers like Boris Johnson, Michael Gove and Liam Fox, who want May’s hard Brexit outside the single market, customs union and jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice and only a short transitional period so that being “half in” the EU does not become permanent.

In the middle sits David Davis, a pragmatic Brexiteer ready to make some compromises to get an agreement with the EU. Like Johnson, Davis is widely thought to be on leadership manoeuvres, and at 68 has an interest in May departing sooner rather than after the Brexit talks in 2019 as she wishes.

Ironically, the jockeying for position has probably strengthened May in the short term. “They have damaged their own chances,” said one former minister. “Backbenchers are seething; they won’t forget this.”

Tory MPs are increasingly reluctant to embark on a leadership contest bound to become a bloodbath as it would be dominated by Brexit. But May could be too weak to take up the invitation from Tory backbench leaders to sack one or more of the cabinet plotters; she may prefer to limp on and keep them inside her flimsy tent.

But it won’t be a happy or safe place because the differences over Brexit are so fundamental. It reminds me of how Tory discipline broke down during John Major’s battles with his cabinet “bastards” and rebellious Europhobics over the Maastricht Treaty in the 1990s.

Then blind devotion to their anti-EU crusade trumped the party and national interest. And it is happening again today; a few Tory Brextremists even think a dose of Jeremy Corbyn in power would be worth it if it ensured hard Brexit. In another parallel, Major saw his Commons majority disappear, after the Tories lost a string of by-elections, adding to the sense of drift and fragility.

May seems to be sitting on the fence on Brexit, perhaps fearing the hardliners would move to oust her if she came off it. She should do her final duty to the country by standing up to the Brextremists and backing Hammond’s attempt to ensure a sensible Brexit.