Is Boris Johnson tearing the Tory party apart?

The prime minister is facing an increasing backlash over the sacking of more than 20 of his own MPs, writes Lizzy Buchan

The PM leaves the Houses of Parliament after MPs voted to seize control of the Brexit agenda on Tuesday (EPA)

The image that sticks in the mind from this momentous week was Theresa May, smiling to herself on the back benches.

The notoriously inscrutable ex-prime minister must have felt a sense of vindication as she watched Boris Johnson go off the rails, after he antagonised her for months, insisting that he could deliver Brexit where she had failed.

The idea that the Brexit impasse could be smashed through sheer belief and force of personality must seem a distant memory to Johnson now.

Rebel efforts to thwart no deal are on course to succeed and Johnson cannot even call an election because Jeremy Corbyn will not let him.

On top of that, he is facing an increasing backlash from within the Conservative Party over his ruthless pursuit of Brexit at any cost.

Despite rebelling against May many times, Johnson sacked more than 20 Tory MPs for defying the government over the anti-no-deal legislation on Tuesday.

The extraordinary blood-letting – which destroyed any vestige of a majority – included ex-chancellor Philip Hammond, Ken Clarke, the father of the house, and Sir Nicholas Soames, grandson of the PM’s hero Winston Churchill.

The backlash has been ferocious.

More than 100 MPs from the One Nation caucus backed a letter, by ex-cabinet minister Damian Green, urging the prime minister to reinstate the sacked rebels.

Green described the decision to purge moderate Tories as “monstrously unfair”, which would serve as an “early present” for the Liberal Democrats in a snap election.

Ruth Davidson, who resigned as Scottish Tory leader last week amid rumours of conflicts with Johnson, said: “How, in the name of all that is good and holy, is there no longer room in the Conservative Party for Nicholas Soames?”

Simon Hoare, the Tory chairman of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee, also spoke out over the “deep disquiet” in the party and urged the prime minister to act more like Churchill than Stalin.

But a Downing Street source told The Independent: “There is no wavering on that decision.

“They were told very clearly before the vote that they would no longer be MPs.

“They did so in the knowledge that there wouldn’t be a way back and they still made that choice.”

The move was designed to strike fear into rebel hearts but, in fact, it only emboldened the MPs to stick to their guns, rather than stay in a party that no longer represented their values.

Many moderate MPs are uncomfortable that anything but full-throated support for a no-deal Brexit will see them turfed out of the party.

Others are simply angry at the treatment of their colleagues, some of whom had served the Tory party for decades.

Jaws dropped across Westminster when even the prime minister’s own brother, Jo Johnson, announced he would quit the government and stand down as an MP.

He said he had been “torn between family loyalty and the national interest”, which he described as ”an unresolvable tension”.

If his own brother thinks the party is veering off the rails, it does not bode well for Johnson’s chances of keeping the Tories together.

Hammond was right when he accused the prime minister of turning the Conservatives into the “Brexit Party”, as Johnson has only one goal – leaving the EU next month, with or without a deal.

May was a Tory through and through, and she genuinely loved the party she had been a member of since her teenage years.

Johnson and the people around him are not so committed to preserving the party, including his controversial aide Dominic Cummings, who is not believed to be a Tory member.

Johnson may yet achieve his aim of delivering Brexit “do or die”. But at what cost to his party?