What the 8 Tory Brexit tribes want

To understand how Brexit might play out you need to understand the UK's ruling Conservative Party.

POLITICO photo-illustration (Source images by AFP via Getty Images)

LONDON — Remainers versus Brexiteers — in the Tory Party it is not that simple.

Understanding the shades of Brexit opinion in the U.K.’s governing party is key to any attempt to predict how Brexit will play out as talks in Brussels enter their endgame.

Here is POLITICO’s guide to the factions among Tory MPs, and how they will react if and when Theresa May brings home a deal from Brussels.

1. Militant Brexiteers

What they want: World Trade Organization rules would be just fine. No deal, no sweat.

How many? Sixty-two signed a letter listing the group’s key demands in February. The even more militant core group is smaller.

The shorthand for this group in Westminster is the European Research Group (ERG), although the ERG organization as a whole is a much broader church. It is the leadership of the organization that is the most hard-line.

It is easy to identify these noisy, passionate obsessives. The likes of former Brexit Minister Steve Baker and ERG Chairman Jacob Rees-Mogg are often on television screens or occupying newspaper column inches.

And they have the numbers to shift the U.K. government’s course. A case in point was the raft of amendments to the Customs Bill they put forward in July to register their distaste for elements of May’s compromise plan agreed at her Chequers country residence. The prime minister appeared to have little choice but to accept.

A #Standup4Brexit campaign against the Chequers deal has also been gaining traction through the summer, and claims to have 18 Tory MP supporters.

Whips are hoping for a peaceful two weeks between MPs returning to Westminster and conference season, but one Remain-inclined Tory MP thinks the dynamics will depend on how active this group is. There are reports they will put forward their own alternative to Chequers before the Tory conference.

“Quite how Mrs. May would ever be able to buy that, even if there were 100 Tory colleagues in favor of it, on the basis she said right at the beginning those sort of deals were not ambitious enough for Britain … that is going to be tricky for her,” the Remain-voting Tory MP said.

2. ERG-lite

What they want: Hard Brexit, but less strident than the ultra-Brexiteers.

How many? The less noisy of the 62 who signed the February letter.

The official figure for paid-up members of the European Research Group is not public, but is believed to be a few dozen. But there are many more, around 100, on the ERG WhatsApp group. One follower (not a full member) says views in this wider ERG-lite community are much more varied.

Some are MPs who voted and campaigned for Remain in the referendum, but now support a hard Brexit. Others are Brexiteers sympathetic to the purist cause espoused by the ERG, but who don’t want to shout about it just yet.

When it comes to parliamentary votes, this constituency has not (yet) crossed into the rebel divide. The ERG’s alternative Brexit could be the big test.

3. Brexit egos

What they want: To kill Chequers.

How many? 2

Boris Johnson and David Davis — who resigned in opposition to the Chequers plan from their posts as foreign and Brexit secretaries — really need their own category.

Johnson is now as much journalist as politician, attracting headlines through his weekly and lucrative Daily Telegraph column — including this week’s, in which he lambasted Chequers as a “historic mistake.” His strategy from here will be strongly influenced by his own leadership ambitions. It remains to be seen how Davis will play Brexit now that he is on the backbenches.

4. Careerists

What they want: To keep the Tories in power — and their jobs.

How many? A few dozen.

There are plenty of ministers — both Remain- and Leave-backing — who are unhappy about the current state of Brexit negotiations, but believe it is better to stay inside the government tent.

On the Brexit side, Andrea Leadsom, Michael Gove, Penny Mordaunt, Esther McVey and Suella Braverman have stomached the Chequers deal despite reservations — but allies say they could find it hard to stay if May is forced to concede more to the European Union.

There are Remain-backing ministers in equal agony, among them Chancellor Philip Hammond and Cabinet Office Minister David Lidington.

“Lidders, he is very careful what he says for obvious reasons, but you get the impression he gets incredibly exasperated by the claims by the Breixteers,” said one Tory MP who knows him well.

5. Pragmatists

What they want: A deal, almost any deal.

How many? Reports suggest 50 have joined the Brexit Delivery Group.

This group doesn’t buy the slogan that no deal is better than a bad deal and want to do everything they can to help the prime minister get one.

Many are trying to work across the factional divides. Simon Hart is among those who have set up the new Brexit Delivery Group. Its raison d’être is to give May room to negotiate without setting any red lines.

Former Cabinet ministers Amber Rudd and Damian Green appear to have taken this approach. This group are loyal to May and desperate to get to March without a general election.

The whips need to keep a close eye on these MPs though, according to one Tory veteran.

“My experience of the whip is you are never surprised by the usual suspects who are threatening to rebel, it is when somebody [who doesn’t go around threatening to rebel] says to the whips ‘I don’t like this at all.’ That is when the alarm bells ring,” he said.

6. Soft-Brexit rebels

What they want: The least disruptive Brexit possible.

How many? 12 voted against the government to keep the U.K. inside the EU customs union.

This group of friends, which includes Nicky Morgan, Stephen Hammond, Antoinette Sandbach and Dominic Grieve, have been willing to rebel against the government, and have had their mugshots splashed across the Brexit-backing Daily Mail front page as a result.

Most believe the U.K. should be exploring an off-the-shelf arrangement with the European Union to avoid disruption to trade. The referendum provided no mandate about which type of Brexit to pursue, they argue.

May only narrowly survived their rebellion before parliament’s recess after they attempted to force her to explore a customs union with the European Union.

There are others who are sympathetic. George Freeman wrote a ConservativeHome article in favor of joining the European Free Trade Association or the European Economic Area this month.

“Now, I believe, our most realistic chance of a smooth exit is by adopting the off-the-shelf EEA/EFTA option as a stepping stone to a longer term Free Trade Agreement with the EU,” he wrote.

One member of this group said they would likely start to work with the pragmatists if May starts looking like she is veering toward the ERG Brexit blueprint.

7. People’s Vote brigade

What they want: A referendum on the Brexit deal.

How many? 4

A small group of Conservatives has joined forces with other ardent Remainers from across the political spectrum to advocate a referendum on the final deal that May brings back from Brussels.

Former Business Minister Anna Soubry, who has been one of Brexit’s most vocal critics in the Tory Party, has advocated a so-called People’s Vote.

Philip Lee, who resigned from the government over its handling of Brexit; health select committee chair Sarah Wollaston; and former Cabinet minister Justine Greening are all due to speak at the Conservatives for a People’s Vote campaign at the party’s conference in Birmingham.

8. Agnostics

What they want: A quiet life without Brexit.

How many? The rest

These are the MPs doing their best to stay out of the fight. They would like to move on from the divisiveness of Britain’s EU exit and get on with doing the other things they got into politics to tackle.

One Tory veteran of the House of Commons tea rooms said media coverage often resembles the movie “Casablanca” — “round up the usual suspects.”

“If it is something ludicrous Brexiteers are coming out with it is likely to be Anna Soubry interviewed [to rebut it], if the Brexiteers are worked up it could be Jacob Rees-Mogg, or dial-a-quote Andrew Bridgen, and I think the bulk of the parliamentary party tend to discount a lot of this.”

The MP said that many in the party are looking for “a replacement for Theresa May who is not an extreme Brexiteer or an extreme Remainer.”

There’s no escaping Brexit first though.

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