You can enable subtitles (captions) in the video player
Our failure to deliver Brexit has put our country and our party in grave peril. The leadership I offer is based on one simple truth: without Brexit, there will be no Conservative government and maybe no Conservative party. Whoever delivers Brexit will win the next election for the Conservative party. But without Brexit, no Conservative prime minister can win.
I've always said I'd be prepared to leave without a deal if there was a straight choice between no deal and no Brexit. But I do so with a heavy heart because of the risks to businesses and the risks to the union. And I would not do so if a deal that commands the support of parliament was in sight.
But parliament has made clear its intentions to take no-deal off the table no matter what the new prime minister says or does. So without any deal, without a deal, any prime minister who promised to leave by a certain date would have to call a general election to change the parliamentary arithmetic. And that is an election we would lose badly because the lessons of the European and Peterborough elections are clear. If we fight an election before delivering Brexit we will be annihilated.
