PM tells warring Tories: ‘The stakes are higher than ever’

Crunch time

PM Theresa May has called on her Conservative party to “stand together” over Brexit, days before a crunch meeting at Chequers.

At a meeting today, May said she “looked forward to the full discussion which will take place at Chequers on Friday, when decisions will be taken on the future partnership the UK is seeking with the EU”.

But just hours before, May appealed to her party at a Conservative fundraising event not to allow the scale of the Brexit challenge to “overwhelm us” as the stakes were ‘higher than we have ever known in our political lifetimes’.

“The stakes are high. Perhaps higher than we have ever known in our political lifetimes. We each have a choice to make,” she said at the fundraiser yesterday, according to her office.

Her message comes just a day after very public spats between ministers and backbenchers.