After a marathon five-hour crunch meeting Theresa May’s cabinet has backed her Brexit deal.
But the prime minister now faces a vicious backlash from the Brexit wing of her party who are threatening to prompt a leadership challenge.
It is believed May told the cabinet it was her deal, no deal or the risk of Brexit not happening at all.
Even though the deal has passed cabinet rumours persist in Westminster that some ministers could still quit over the 500-page document.
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Sources said as many as 10 ministers did not back the deal and it was only passed on a majority vote.
May announced she will make a statement to the House of Commons tomorrow.
Outside Downing Street she said: ‘The choice was this deal that enables us to take back control and to build a brighter future for our country or going back to square one with more division, more uncertainty and a failure to deliver on the referendum.
‘It is my job as prime minister to explain the decisions that the Government has taken and I stand ready to do that beginning tomorrow with a statement in parliament.
Photo: PA / Victoria Jones – Credit: PA Wire/PA Images
‘I believe that what I owe to this country is to take decisions that are in the national interest and I firmly believe with my head and my heart that this is a decision which is in the best interests of our entire United Kingdom.’
But in a potentially explosive move European Research Group chairman Jacob Rees-Mogg said they should not support the deal.
In a letter to Tory MPs he said the proposals did not match the expectations set out in May’s Lancaster House speech.
‘The proposed agreement will see the UK hand over £39 billion to the EU for little or nothing in return,’ he added.
The deal is ‘unacceptable to unionists’, will ‘lock us into an EU customs union and EU laws’ and is ‘profoundly undemocratic’.
‘For these reasons I can not support the proposed agreement in parliament and would hope that Conservative MPs would do likewise,’ he said.
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