It was at a meeting in the cabinet room of No 10 Downing Street on Tuesday that Amber Rudd finally lost patience with Boris Johnson and decided she should resign from his government.

The prime minister had summoned a dozen of the Brexit rebels to try to persuade them that they should support him. While Rudd — a remain voter who backed Johnson because she thought he was sincere about seeking a new agreement with Brussels — watched, she says the prime minister alienated his critics and then her by failing to explain how he would get a deal.

“There doesn’t seem to be any evidence of deal planning and that’s what the people who came into that room on Tuesday really wanted to