Theresa May’s electoral gamble turned out to be as stupid and disastrous as her feeble response to the Muslim attacks in Manchester and London.
A shaky Theresa May vowed to fight on today despite suffering catastrophic losses as her election gamble humiliatingly backfired – leaving a hung parliament just 10 days before Brexit talks are due to start.
As the Tories’ Commons majority was brutally stripped away by voters, Mrs May faced open calls from her own MPs to ‘consider her position’ as a jubilant Jeremy Corbyn demanded she make way for him to become PM.
But an ashen-faced Mrs May, who called the contest three years early in a bid to capitalise on sky-high poll ratings, insisted the Conservatives were still the largest party with an expected 319 seats. She insisted the country needed a ‘period of stability’, adding: ‘It is incumbent on us to ensure that we have that.’
As the knives came out for Mrs May, former chancellor George Osborne lambasted her campaign performance as ‘wooden’ and her manifesto as a disaster, making clear he did not believe she could survive for long. Former minister Anna Soubry, who was reelected in Broxtowe, added her voice to calls for Mrs May to consider resigning. Asked exactly where the Tory campaign had gone wrong, Ms Soubry said bluntly: ‘Where do you want me to start?’ Another Tory MP, Nigel Evans, said the party had ‘shot ourselves in the head’.
With English and Welsh voters seemingly punishing Mrs May for calling the ballot unnecessarily, the only thing saving her from utter disaster was the Tory performance in Scotland. The party’s leader north of the border, Ruth Davidson, inspired a 12-seat surge that unseated the SNP’s former First Minister Alex Salmond in Gordon and Westminster leader Angus Robertson in Moray.
May has to resign. She’s less viable as a national leader than David Cameron after Brexit. The reason for the Conservative Party collapse is obvious: UKIP’s growth was, in part, the result of Labour voters voting for Brexit. That accomplished, they had no reason to vote for the Tories once May revealed herself to be a feckless multiculturalists who was too thick to run on a pro-Brexit, anti-immigration line.
Her response to the two Muslim attacks sealed the loss of her Parliamentary majority. Everyone knew that she wasn’t going to do a damn thing about it. Furthermore, the press had painted Jeremy Corbyn as such a no-hoper that people felt safe voting for Labour as a protest vote.
I’m not at all worried about Brexit. If the political class attempts to spin the lack of support for an anti-Brexit prime minister as support for going back to the European Union, they’ll soon find out how little control they actually possess.
Take her down, Boris. Now is the time.
UPDATE: Boris appears to know it has fallen to him to lead his nation to freedom. Greatness beckons, but will require boldness to seize it.
Boris Johnson is the favorite to be the next Tory leader – and has already refused to back Theresa May after her election nightmare. The outspoken Foreign Secretary was repeatedly asked if he believes Mrs May should be Prime Minister but would only say ‘it’s early days’ after retaining his Uxbridge seat. He also stayed silent when a reporter suggested that the Tory leader was ‘fatally wounded’.