Like Maggie Thatcher all those years ago, Theresa May’s future and that of the country is in the hands of her (remaining) cabinet

If I were May, and I managed to get the cabinet – what’s left of it – behind me, then I would certainly tough it out, inviting the hard Brexiteers to come and get me if they think they’re hard enough

A World Cup year with England in the semi-finals. A female Tory prime minister in trouble. A blindly ambitious blonde rival following the cue of a more low-key but nonetheless determined colleague in resigning from her cabinet… and a new Conservative leader and prime minister within weeks?

Well, there are echoes. Like Margaret Thatcher, who admittedly was better at winning general elections, Theresa May has become out of touch (if she ever was “in touch”). Like the toxic poll tax for Thatcher, her universal credit reform and proposals for a “dementia tax” have upset Middle England.

The European issue was splitting the Tory party from top to bottom; plus ca change. Thatcher humiliated her then deputy prime minister, Sir Geoffrey Howe, a proud man, in front of colleagues – just as May has done with David Davis. Eventually the worm turned. Howe suggested others should consider their consciences – though Davis urged his colleagues not to do so (sincerely or not).

The cue was taken by the perennial ambitious blonde – Michael Heseltine then, Boris Johnson now. Neither man was noted for the warmth of their relationship with the female premier of the day. To be fair, both have a different “vision” of Conservatism.

Within a few weeks Britain had a new prime minister, the man they least expected to get or take the job. Today...?

It depends – on the very rickety cabinet we have. Forget all the stuff about Tory MPs sending letters in to the 1922 Committee: May will survive if and only if she commands the support of her cabinet.

In essence Thatcher was dumped by her cabinet – through a series of one-to-one interviews when they told her, most of them, that the game was up and she would only damage herself, her party and country by hanging on. She later called it “treachery with a smile on its face”.

I wonder how many of the current cabinet might offer the same advice, directly, collectively, or via the whips to May? Not many are mates of hers – Karen Bradley and James Brokenshire, yes, but more are, er, ambivalent. Philip Hammond? Chris Grayling? Jeremy Hunt? Sajid Javid? Gavin Williamson? Michael Gove? Esther McVey? Maybe not, but would they prefer Johnson and chaos? Would they unite around Gove or Javid? Could that pair organise a pact – Javid in Number 10, Gove at Number 11? Vice versa? Would someone else on the Eurosceptic wing challenge them? Would Johnson? The future of Britain lies in their hands. Heaven help us.

If I were May, and I managed to get the cabinet, what’s left of it, behind me, then I would certainly tough it out, inviting the hard Brexiteers to come and get me if they think they’re hard enough.

She has nothing to lose – and a country to win back. The very difficulty of organising a succession works greatly in her favour – even if the hard Brexit wing had more support than they have. Today the old “Leave” campaigners are split – Johnson and Davis on one side, with Farage, but Gove and Raab and (so far) Fox and Leadsom on the other, now joined by new Leave believers Hunt and Javid.

Probably by accident, May has split and outfoxed them. She may even have overdone it, as there is a clear majority in the Commons for a soft Brexit – and she may need to work with opposition parties to survive against her own benches, and concede more to them than to the likes of Johnson. Strange days ahead.

Back in 1990, the Tory leadership election was matter for MPs only. Bits of it were nasty – but it was soon over.

This time round it would mean a lengthy bloodbath – and the hard Brexiteers haven’t got the numbers in parliament to oust May. Their only chance is to harass her out of office, though you’d think she’d be immune to that by now, all things considered. A leadership challenge would take weeks if not months to resolve. The PM and the country simply have not the time for that to happen, and we cannot very well ask the EU to postpone all our talks while the British Tories have another inconclusive scrap over the leadership and Europe.

The net result of all that? If May stares them out, and realises that her hard Brexit enemies don’t have the numbers, she can survive. She might even emerge stronger – a winner for a change, someone who defied her most troublesome critics. Like Mrs T said – “I fight on, I fight to win.”

Boris is no longer the public’s favourite, nor the activists’ darling (where he has lost ground to Javid and Gove). He cannot win, and he knows it. If he does launch some sort of leadership bid it will be as a suicide mission. The hard Brexit wing of the Tory party has colourful figures that make a vast amount of noise, but they simply do not command that level of support in the parliamentary party or the country to prevail. Nor, one detects, the cabinet. There is no majority for a “crash out” of the EU – and that would only happen if a Johnson leadership challenge actually wrecked the talks so badly that that was the only outcome left. Suicide blonde indeed.