SO THE result is in. Mrs May has survived to fight another day – and she will have to fight.

But was it sensible to subject her to this ordeal when the EU never ceases to benefit from the ceaseless efforts to undermine her authority, thereby weakening any chance of achieving an acceptable result in our negotiations?

Having been passed a problem that no one else has demonstrated A better ability to resolve – when David Cameron found the going too tough – she has been trying to find a way of overcoming the terms of an agreement intended to permanently bind us to the EU.

To add insult to injury, she has been faced with a position where numerous MPs, on both sides of the House, have loudly repudiated the result of the Referendum and continued to disrupt negotiations.

How often have we heard members of the public claiming that we knew nothing about the facts, when we voted in the Referendum?

But is this true. Did they determine how we came to be in the position where we are today?

Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union, was enacted by the Treaty of Lisbon on December 1, 2009. This introduced for the first time a procedure for a member state to withdraw voluntarily from the European Union.

Surprisingly, little has been said regarding this development.

There was fierce public opposition to the Lisbon Treaty and mounting calls for the public to have its say.

However, despite the Government’s 2005 manifesto pledge to hold a plebiscite on the European Constitution, Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, rejected a call for a Referendum on the Treaty of Lisbon.

This was viewed as one of the biggest acts of political betrayal in modern British history.

At the time, several Labour backbenchers rebelled against the decision and a series of unofficial mini-referenda held across several marginal seats were reported to have revealed that 89 per cent of more than 150,000 voters had voted against the treaty.

The treaty was seen as the biggest threat to national sovereignty in Europe since the Second World War and would threaten the future of the Anglo-American Special Relationship, and would significantly weaken the transatlantic alliance.

The treaty was also seen as a blueprint for a European super state dreamt up by unelected bureaucrats in Brussels.

Much more could be written on this subject, including the fact that in the absence of Gordon Brown, Foreign Secretary David Miliband, was our representative at the official signing ceremony of the treaty, and more particularly, that prior to his government’s departure there was a call for the next British government, which was due to be elected in 2010, to hold a Referendum.

Neil Kelly Tredcroft Road Hove