United Kingdom : PM May survived vote of no confidence

The threshold of 48 letters sent to the 1922 Committee, needed to call a no - confidence vote , had been reached. Prime Minister Theresa May needed to secure at least 158 Tory votes to save her job. She eventually won by 200 votes to 117 . H er leadership can no longer be challenged by the Tories for 12 months . The outcome of the vote was expected several hours before it took place, which explained the rebound of the sterling and the rise in bond yields since yesterday noon . Indeed, T. May’s victory makes a no-deal Brexit less likely. But this result is not very c omfortable for the prime minister : more than a third of the Conservative MPs (37%) voted against her, meaning that her credibility remains weak. T. May had to vow to step down before the 2022 general elections. Not surprisingly, Jacob Rees- Mogg called on her to resign after the announcement of the result. U ncertainties remain huge: MPs won’t have stronger reason s to support T. May’s plan – the withdrawal agreement – in January (if the vote takes place next month) than today. It’s still impossible to anticipate what will happen after March 2019. But given that the EU is unwilling to resume talks, the alternative plans are not numerous, and would probably not get the support of many MPs (a no-deal Brexit is too costly in terms of growth, a no Brexit would be, for a lot of MPs, a denial of democracy); Opposition parties can organize at any time a no-confidence vote in T. May’ s government. The SNP, the Lib Dem and other small parties urged the Labour to join them in tabling a motion of no confidence. In short, we are back to the situation that prevailed after T. May’s decision to delay the vote on the withdrawal bill. Barely a relief…