Hello and welcome to Coffeehouse Shots, The Spectator's Political Podcast. I'm Laura Prendergast,

and I'm today joined by Fraser Nelson and Jane Forsyth. So Fraser May has been trying to shore up Labour support.

How's it going? Well, we're not quite sure yet. We're told that she's in talks with Len McCluskey,

not something you'd expect to hear every day of the political week.

The first time they've spoken, Len McCluskey, of course, is one of Jeremy Corbyn's most powerful union backers.

What we're seeing now is two things.

Firstly, we're seeing Theresa May emboldened by the fact that her party can't sack her anymore.

After the failed leadership putsch, she is now invincible from leadership challenges for about a year. So she can go to the left

if she wants. It says the second thing that she's doing. She's saying to her party, well, sure,

you Tories might not back my deal, but maybe Labour MPs will. So I'm going to start

talking to Labour to see what they would like, what sweeteners I can give them, and then see how

many Labour rebels I can peel off. Now, the question is, where is this going? What's the objective

here? She hasn't said what her strategy is, but I've been speaking to a few ministers who've got a fair idea.

Her policy, in effect, is what you might call red Brexit, that she is going to make more and more concessions to the Labour Party.

And when the Tories back her deal, she'll stop.

Now, one minister told me that, sure, she will lose the vote on Tuesday next week, but she could have another and another and another each time offering more concessions to labour.

And the only way of making her stop this would be for the Tories to back her.

Now, will this work? The problem is the numbers.

The BBC tried some figures yesterday and came out with an extraordinary 228 votes that

Theresa May is going to lose by. Now, I reckon there are about 20 max Labour rebels that John Mann and

others might be able to deliver. So for her strategy to work, you'd either need to win around

Corbyn himself or you would need Corbyn to abstain on the major vote.

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