Theresa May may be ousted this evening - Confidence vote called.

[sunonmars]

https://news.sky.com/story/live-may-on-the-brink-of-a-leadership-challenge-11578479

She's probably finished.

[Kentonio]

1. Hugely unlikely

The Tories don’t have a replacement lined up who can command enough support, and the job is a poisoned chalice with Brexit going on.

[sunonmars]

2. Doesnt matter, she has lost her command and votes.

She has no majority, Dup will dump agreement if is kept, at least 1/5th will be willing to drop her, she wont be able to pass a damn thing.

She's done, even if she scrapes it, she'll probably resign.

This is also a secret ballot, they can say what they like in public to support her but in private, then backstab her later.

[Kentonio]

3. I wish it would happen, but I don't see it.

It only took 48 letters to call this vote, and there's a lot of fear in the party about Labour forcing a general election. Even the most hardcore Tory remainers like Anna Soubry have openly said they'd prefer hard Brexit to a Corbyn government (typically putting party before country like the cowards always do).

And what happens if she does lose the vote and a new person comes in? It's probably going to be someone more hard Brexit than her, they'll still have exactly the same parliamentary arithmatic as she has, and they'll have even less internal support for their Brexit plan because even more moderates will peal off if it looks like no deal is even on the table.

I don't know, its such complete chaos that I think the Tories are more likely to huddle around May to try and stop their complete disintegration.

I would absolutely love to be wrong about this though.

[sunonmars]

4. It'll be worse if they keep her, utter decimation at the ballot box.

[Kentonio]

5. They don't have to hold an election until 2022 though.

They could get Brexit out the way and then replace her once things calm down a bit.

[sunonmars]

6. She is unable to get any legislation passed, no majority. This is paramount.

[Kentonio]

7. How does that change though?

Any replacement inherits exactly the same parliament as May has now, and none of them are popular enough to risk another election. There also isn't really any Brexit stance they can take which would be any less divisive within her party than May (who has tried to sit in the middle as much as she can).

[OnDoutside]

8. I agree with you, also if this fails they can't do another for 12 months.

[CottonBear]

9. Can May propose to reverse decision to Brexit as the EU Court just ruled is possible to do?

Would the Tories ever even consider screeching to a halt at the brink of the Brexit precipice?

I’m American. My British friends and relatives think May will allow the UK to crash out rather than call it off, which could be done without a new referendum?

[Kentonio]

12. The default position is to crash out

But I’m not sure there’s nearly enough Tories willing to follow that disasterous path to allow it to happen. It would destroy their party electorally for a generation. Unless they could get the public to vote for it in a second referendum of course.

[CottonBear]

15. It seems like a hard border in N. Ireland is the sticky wicket. N/T

[Hortensis]

13. Fwiw, I've read opinion that she's not the resigning type.

[sunonmars]

11. actually poll after poll has shown that a small number do.

[Denzil_DC]

14. I don't know what polls you've been looking at, but that's not true.

Support has varied since the original vote, but generally runs in the 40-45% range even before the recent even greater chaos: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_United_Kingdom_European_Union_membership_referendum#Support_for_a_second_referendum

The polls started shifting in July, when YouGov found 42% in favour, compared to 31% in April: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/aug/19/public-support-shifting-toward-second-brexit-referendum-explainer

A People's Vote poll released on 15 November found 59% in favour: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:YddqtuwyazUJ:https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-deal-theresa-may-second-referendum-remain-leave-yougov-poll-draft-agreement-a8635341.html+&cd=6&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk

Whatever the quibbles with these polls (the YouGov ones are probably a more reliable tracker than the People's Vote ones), none of them could be interpreted as showing "a small number".