The media is full of speculation that Mrs May is set to announce this morning a timetable for her departure, as the Tory party suffers a collective nervous breakdown. I assume the 10th of June will be the probable start date for a contest to select a new leader. The 1922 Committee will want to have it all finished by mid July before summer recess starts on the 20th, otherwise the new prime minister won't be in place until September, with the clock ticking dangerously close to October 31st.
Party members have always been far more extreme than the MPs who represent them and they will demand at least one hard line Brexiteer in the final two of the leadership contest. The hang 'em and flog 'em brigade will not be sated this time with anyone less than a genuine, take-us-to-the-barricades, no-deal advocate, who will go in hard in Brussels. If we thought May's negotiating tactics and leadership was bad, wait until BoJo or Raab have a go. We might look back fondly on the chaos of the last three years as a time of unparalleled stability.
Unfortunately, whoever replaces the hapless May will almost certainly be in a worse position than she was with a new, untested cabinet, most of the time already gone with just a few weeks to resolve the greatest national crisis we have faced in peacetime and without an obvious plan.
And there is also no way a Brexiteer can hold the parliamentary party together as leader. We are surely seeing the beginning of the break up of the Conservatives. This is inevitable in my opinion.
As far as the parliamentary arithmetic is concerned, the new leader will need every vote, perhaps even more than May, since even Labour Brexiteers may not be able to offer support, and it is likely the more pro-European Tories will give up the whip.
A general election is unthinkable with a new poll (HERE) showing the Brexit party, if it polls anything close to present levels, will cost the Tories 113 seats. Even Farage doing half as well could cost them 67 seats - so a GE will go on the far-too-risky pile. Don't worry about that.
The new PM will also need to speak very carefully to avoid a sterling crash. I note the pound, although recovering a little this morning, is the worst performing major currency so far this month, having lost 3.3% of its value against the dollar. It's now worth $1.2615. The pound has also weakened for a record 14 consecutive days against the euro.
A bit of fighting talk from the new PM about a no deal Brexit will make the currency charts resemble one of those rides at Alton Towers - with similar vomit inducing results.
It also occurred to me that we are now witnessing a strange reversal of history. Instead of prime ministers throwing troops at the European enemy as it was a century ago, the troops (aka The Tory party) are now throwing prime ministers at the machine guns. Cameron was supposed to be the saviour but he went even before the cheering had died away in 2016 after a futile charge. May was anointed and pushed into the fray only to disappear under a hail of fire from her own side. Next up will be a Brexiteer, hailed by the troops as a secret weapon, I doubt if he or she will be able to stumble out of the trenches in the right direction.
One can only admire the sheer gullibility of the Tory membership.
This is an extract from Beyond the Fringe in 1960:
Peter Cook: I want you to lay down your life, Perkins. We need a futile gesture at this stage. It will raise the whole tone of the war. Get up in a crate, Perkins, pop over to Bremen, take a shufti, don't come back. Goodbye, Perkins. God, I wish I was going too.
Jonathan Miller: Goodbye, sir — or is it — au revoir?
Peter Cook: No, Perkins.
Fraser Nelson thinks BoJo could be installed by the summer (HERE) in which case substitute Johnson for Perkins and Brussels for Bremen and watch out for Johnson's 'crate' crashing and burning very soon.
Like everyone else I have absolutely no idea how Brexit will eventually play out. The real options are staying in or leaving without an agreement. I don't believe there is such a thing as a unifying deal acceptable to parliament as it is now implacably constituted. Even the most optimistic Brexiteers think a no deal Brexit will cause some disruption, although others are less sanguine. It will be a disaster in my opinion.
Remainers are going to have the easier argument. Currency markets have suspended belief for the last three years and never thought we would go over the cliff voluntarily. The pound will therefore tank, for sure. Our side will be trying to convince people that the mounting evidence of their own eyes is true. This will not be difficult. The closure of Honda in Swindon and British Steel's entry into compulsory administration is a foretaste of things to come. The great betrayal has already started.
Brexiteers will need to do the opposite and provide soothing words to persuade people what their own eyes tell them is actually false, always a daunting task, short of hypnosis. Leavers will have to be told factory closures, rising unemployment and inflation are either entirely unconnected to Brexit or a price worth paying - and many will accept it, and defend it. But most will not.
Support for Brexit, already on a slippery slope, will plunge and a new referendum will begin to look like the only solution left.
