Each day, I can see more clearly a pivotal line from Theresa May’s future biography: ‘Ultimately, her downfall can be traced to one mistake: her failure to seek her own mandate and call and general election in the spring of 2017, when Labour was at its weakest and she was still enjoying a political honeymoon.’
A fortnight ago William Hague made the case for an early election. Since then, the evidence has grown. In the past 24 hours alone the lights outside the Prime Minister’s windows have twice flashed: go to the country now, or you will regret it.
The U-turn on National Insurance for the self-employed should be warning enough. It is hard not to see Hammond’s failure to see that he would be breaking a manifesto promise in terms of the change of personnel in Downing Street. May’s Cabinet does not see itself as a continuation of Cameron’s cabinet and therefore does not feel bound by the manifesto on which he went to the country in 2015.
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