Ministers pile pressure on PM Theresa May to resign

Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May is expected to lose tomorrow's vote on her Brexit deal. Photo / AP

Theresa May is facing increasing pressure to resign within weeks after it was claimed she has lost the backing of all but two of her Cabinet ministers.

The Prime Minister has already said she will not contest the 2022 general election, but her ministers want her gone by July so that a new leader can conduct the next phase of the Brexit negotiations, should Britain avoid a no-deal exit.

Members of the Cabinet have privately discussed whether they should tell her at the end of this week that her time is up, after what is expected to be a series of disastrous votes in Parliament. May is expected to lose tomorrow's vote on her Brexit deal, with MPs expected to block a no-deal Brexit in another vote the following day.

Parliament will then vote on whether to delay Brexit, which Eurosceptics have warned would hand the reins to the EU and make May's position untenable. She could even be gone by Wednesday night if Labour tables - and wins - a fresh no-confidence vote in the Government, which Downing Street fears could happen.

Her main rivals have been preparing their leadership bids for months, with Dominic Raab, the former Brexit secretary, making a speech today about the need for a "second-chance society" as part of his ongoing attempt to prove he is ready for the job.

Jeremy Hunt, Boris Johnson, Sajid Javid and Liz Truss have also been sounding out MPs to gauge support.

Asked yesterday whether May would still be PM at Christmas, Raab told Sky News: "I don't know. She said she's going to step down, I would like to see her be able to do that in a way which is on terms of her own choosing, but I think the Government has found itself in a precarious situation and particularly I think if the Government extends Article 50 or tries to reverse, effectively, the Brexit promises that we've made, I think that situation will get even trickier."

Former education secretary Nicky Morgan said May's position "is going to become slowly less and less tenable" if her Brexit policy is "dismantled" by Parliament.

She said: "If the votes go in a way which means that the Prime Minister's policy, as she has set out and stuck to rigidly over the course of the last two-and-a-bit a years, is taken away, I think it would be very difficult for the Prime Minister to stay in office for very much longer."

Cabinet minister want Theresa May gone by July. Photo / AP

Morgan said it may be up to the Cabinet to tell May that the time has come for her to go. She said: "They are going to have to take a role in saying potentially to the Prime Minister 'Actually, things have changed significantly. We think you should think about your position Prime Minister'."

One Cabinet source told The Daily Telegraph: "I would say there are only two ministers in the Cabinet who still support her. Everyone else has lost faith in her ability to lead."

May faces significant hurdles in the weeks ahead. If she is forced to ask the EU for a Brexit delay later this week she will have to abandon her promise to voters that Britain will leave the EU on March 29 - something she has always insisted was written in stone.

With no signs of a deal on the horizon that could command a majority in the Commons, and also the support of the EU, May would then face months of further negotiations which could end up with the UK being in exactly the same place as it is now.

She then faces the prospect of a swathe of Tory council seats being lost in the local elections in May, which many backbench Conservatives believe will be the moment support for her finally runs out.

However, Brexiteers have dismissed suggestions that May could win their support for her deal if she confirms she will be gone before the end of June. David Davis, the former Brexit secretary, told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show: "It won't work, that won't get the vote through. The simple truth is you can change the leader, you can't change the numbers. We've got to focus on the issue here, which is delivering on the Brexit demand of the British people."