So, what next for May's deal?

After a blissful, near Brexit-free Christmas week, mutterings about ‘The Deal’ can be heard once more in the corridors of Westminster. The question on everyone’s lips? What’s changed since the memorable day last month when the Prime Minister decided to pull the meaningful vote at the eleventh hour after 113 of her own MPs publicly announced that they could not or would not support her.

For some journalists and politicos, the answer is nothing whatsoever. Or, if anything, May is on track to lose the rescheduled vote by an even bigger margin than was originally expected. They argue that since the EU is still absolutely adamant that official negotiations on the backstop have closed, and Arlene Foster and the ERG have both made it crystal clear that only legally binding changes to the Withdrawal Agreement would be enough to change their minds, the Prime Minister remains stuck between a (very solid) rock and a hard place.

Bearing in mind that Conservative Party members are overwhelmingly pro-Brexit and anti May’s deal, it’s also believed that allowing MPs the Christmas break to speak to their associations was a mistake on May’s part. After two weeks of listening to sinister grumblings about ‘betraying the will of the people, it’s hard to see why wavering MPs – terrified of deselection – would look upon the deal any more kindly now than they did three weeks ago.

The other school of thought, and the one to which I subscribe, is that the mood has changed in May’s favour. Although Conservative associations are, on the whole, still very exercised about the deal, there is now a general weariness among ordinary people about Brexit. MPs, who will have been out in their constituencies carefully gauging the mood, will have picked up on this, and may now feel that the country would thank them for just biting the bullet, backing May’s compromise, and giving a bit of parliamentary time to the social issues which have been completely overlooked throughout the whole of this saga. What’s more, in the cold light of January, the failed coup against the Prime Minister, organised by the ERG, now looks to some like foolish – and vaguely embarrassing – end-of-term hijinks.

Whichever way you look at it, though, the Prime Minister is by no means out of the woods. If the mood has indeed shifted, one could reasonably expect 20, 30, or even 50 of the 113 naysayer Conservative MPs to throw their support behind May. Given that Jeremy Corbyn has finally shown his true colours (after a lot of pushing, he admitted over Christmas that as Prime Minister he would honour the result of the 2016 referendum) a few Labour Remainers – terrified of no deal and afraid that their second referendum plan has been scuppered by their leader – may also reluctantly agree to support the Prime Minister.

But Theresa May has no majority, meaning that without the support of the DUP she needs the support of almost her entire party, and a handful of Labour MPs to get the deal passed. Given the arithmetic, it’s near impossible to see how that could happen.

So, what next? May’s plan, it seems, is simply to hold the vote again and again – while ramping up the rhetoric about the dangers of no deal – until she gets the result she wants. Can it work? Well if anyone can get her way through sheer, dogged, force, it would be our stubborn Prime Minister.

But it’s a very bumpy road ahead.