The Resignation of Theresa May by John Strafford

 

The Resignation of Theresa May

By

John E. Strafford

In the July issue of “The Critic” Christopher Howarth writes in an article headed Mrs May: My Part in Her Downfall:

“The battle to secure a clean Brexit was won only after the European Research Group secretly obtained a copy of the 1922 Committee rules”.

“a striking fact became obvious quite early on.   There were no publicly available rules of the 1922 Committee.   They were discussed, reported on, people believed they knew what they meant but there was no actual copy”.

“I asked some ERG MPs on the 1922 executive to request a copy from Sir Graham Brady, but they were rebuffed”.

“We managed to find a copy of the rules, the only copy in existence outside Sir Graham Brady’s desk.   I guarded it closely”.

“The rules were dynamite: the famous “no contest within a year” guarantee was moonshine”.   The 22 Executive could change the rules in an afternoon to give us another leadership election.   I now knew what I assume only No. 10 and Sir Graham Brady did: if we defeated May we could get rid of her as leader.”

“No. 10 had a plan to deliver Chequers and Believing that Theresa May’s premiership was secure until 12 December 2019 thought they had time to finally force through their deal.   They were wrong, but only three people knew they were wrong.   I was one of them.” 

 I, John Strafford was another of them.   I set out below how the “missing rules” became public:

After the Conservative Party lost the General Election in 2005, the Leader, Michael Howard MP, announced his resignation but at the same time proposed that the Party Constitution be changed so that MPs had the last say on who should be Leader of the Party rather than the ordinary Party members.   I, and many others, opposed this change and the motion for changing the Constitution was defeated.   During the campaign to elect a new Leader I became aware that the rules for selecting the Leader were incorporated in the Rules of the 1922 Committee, so I wrote a letter to the then Director of Campaigning, Gavin Barwell, at CCHQ asking for a copy of the rules.   I received a copy from Sir Michael Spicer who was then the Chairman of the 1922 Committee as shown below.

On Tuesday 9 April 2019 the Bruges Group held a lunch time meeting in London about Brexit.   One of the speakers was Anne Marie Morris MP, who I had met on a previous occasion.   During the course of the meeting the question arose as to why the MPs did not get rid of the Prime Minister, Theresa May.   Anne Marie Morris gave the standard reply that under the Party Constitution there could not be a Leadership Election within 12 months of the previous one.   At the end of the meeting, I spoke to Anne Marie Morris, who was a member of ERG, and told her that the rules relating to a Leadership election were in the 1922 Committee rules which could be changed.   She asked me to write to her.

On 10 April 2019 I sent the following email to her with a copy to Christopher Hope, the Chief Political Correspondent of the Daily Telegraph:

In the morning of 11 April Anne Marie e-mailed me in response to my e-mail:

“John,

I’ve tried to get all to see this.   The media are saying this just gives the power to alter the timing, not trigger an election.   Thoughts?   I need a bit more ammunition as to how this can work!   Thanks.

Anne Marie”

 Anne Marie was interviewed on the BBC World at One programme.   In the afternoon I e-mailed her:

Anne Marie,

Brilliant interview on the World at One.   You could be changing the course of history.   Well done.   The media are wrong, see below:

I then sent to her examples as to how change could be achieved.  

I stated:

“The 1922 Committee is perfectly entitled to make changes.   It’s only obligation under the Party Constitution is that they “shall be determined by the Executive Committee of the 1922 Committee after consultation of the Board”.

If as required the Board is consulted, 1922 Committee can proceed, even if the Board disagrees.

However, if the 1922 Committee does proceed the Party Board using Clause 17 of the Party Constitution can then overturn it.   That would lead to a serious clash, particularly if the 1922 Committee had the support of the voluntary party with it and they were making the Party more democratic, and it could be seen that ordinary Party members were getting more power.   In these circumstances the Party Board would be seen to be out of touch not only with the voluntary party but also the Parliamentary Party.  The whole legitimacy of the Party Board would come into question, e.g., why is the Party Chairman and a Deputy Chairman appointed by the leader and not elected by the members of the Party and accountable to them.   Is the Party Chairman just a spokesman for the Leader and not speaking in the interest of the whole Party?

I am sure in this situation the Party Board would back down.”

At the same time as I emailed Anne Marie Morris MP I also included a copy of the email to Christopher Hope of The Daily Telegraph as he had expressed interest in the idea.   I had already been in contact with him as I was trying to get Dominic Grieve deselected as my MP.

Christopher came back to me very quickly and asked for a full copy of the Rules of the 1922 Committee, which I sent to him immediately.

Anne Marie then emailed me and asked if I would talk direct to journalists/   I said “yes”.

On 13 April Bill Cash MP of the ERG Group telephoned me and we had a long conversation in which he asked me to send him a report on changing the Leadership election rules and for a full copy of the Rules, which I did.

Late on 13 April the Telegraph published an article on its web site by Sir Michael Spicer and Archibald Hamilton saying the rules could be changed. 

On 14 April the Sunday Telegraph printed the article.   The rest is history.

As Christopher Howarth writes: “ The ’22 Executive went from being split on the desire to act, but not knowing they could act, to having clear authority from the last two Chairmen – who had written the rules – that they could and, indeed, should call a new confidence vote.

News of this development was greeted with shock in Downing Street,   Legal threats were made, but went nowhere.   Sir Graham Brady had to deliver the bad news.   Theresa May had to resign.”

After publication by the Sunday Telegraph, I was inundated by journalists who wanted a copy of the Rules of the 1922 Committee.   They had been told I was the only person with a copy!

It is one of the supreme ironies that it was Gavin Barwell who asked Michael Spicer to send a copy of the rules to me and it was the same Gavin Barwell who as Head of Theresa May’s office stopped anyone getting a copy of the rules.

Mrs May announced her resignation as Prime Minister on 24 May 2019