Boris Johnson and Dominic Raab told to back PM’s Brexit deal or kiss Tory leadership hopes goodbye
PRESSURE was mounting on Friday night on Boris Johnson and Dominic Raab to back the PM’s Brexit deal or kiss goodbye to their Tory leadership hopes.
Conservative MPs from across the Brexit divide spoke out to issue the warning to the two hardline Leavers vying to succeed Theresa May.
Fears of a Tory meltdown and a permanent party split are spiralling if the PM’s divorce agreement is torpedoed for a third and final time next week.
Ex-Cabinet ministers Mr Johnson and Mr Raab are seen as very influential among the die-hards, and would spark momentum for Mrs May if they switched.
Tory Brexiteer Nadine Dorries, who switched to back the deal earlier this month, told The Sun: “I cannot see anyone who doesn’t vote for the deal next time and allows a soft Brexit as a result ever becoming leader of the party because our membership - who will vote for future leaders - will be furious.”
“We’ll end up with a Customs Union Brexit.”
Education minister Nadhim Zahawi – who backed Boris’s leadershjip bid in 2016 – issued a thinly veiled message to him: “If we don’t vote for the Withdrawal Agreement as Brexiteers, there will either be no Brexit, a soft Brexit or total party meltdown.
“If any Parliamentarian wants to deliver on their promise to voters, this is now the only option.”
Tory Remainers also sounded the same alarm.
Pro-EU party grandee Sir Nicholas Soames implored: “We simply have to come together now as a party.
“It seems to be quite extraordinary that those who most wish to bring about our departure from the EU consistently make it impossible to do so.
“For me, anyone who does this will never have my vote.”
Winston Churchill’s grandson Sir Nicholas added: “They will do great damage to the party, and will have alienated themselves from it unless they change their minds.”
Boris was called in to see the PM in No10 earlier this week to hear her personal plea for him to switch his vote, but he still refused.
One friend of the two former Cabinet ministers dubbed them too scared to switch alone, leaving the other to claim the party’s most Europhile crown.
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The senior MP added: “My feeling is both Raab and Boris would quite like to jump now, but they’re both scared of going first”.
Another Tory Brexiteer MP said: “Boris and Dominic seem to be forgetting that many of our members are councillors, and they face a wipe out at the local elections on May 2 if we’re still in the EU for years.
“That will not engender them to anybody.”
Boris met Mrs May yesterday and reminded her of her commitment made after the snap election in 2017 that she would only serve “as long as you want me”, The Daily Telegraph reported.
She made it clear she has no intention of standing down.
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