Theresa May's premiership teetering on the brink as she confronts Cabinet plotters

Mr Gove declared: "It's not the time to change the captain of the ship. This is a time for cool heads. But we absolutely do need to focus on the task at hand and that's making sure that we get the maximum possible support for the Prime Minister and her deal."

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Mr Lidington, Mrs May’s de facto deputy, who said he had no time for plotters, told reporters in his Aylesbury constituency: “I don't think I've any wish to take over from the PM, [who] is doing a fantastic job.”

The two senior ministers were among a number, past and present, who were summoned by Mrs May to her country retreat of Chequers to thrash out a possible last-gasp way forward as her twice-rejected deal looks odds-on to be defeated by MPs for a third and terminal time this week.

Among those present were several senior Brexiteers: Boris Johnson, the former Foreign Secretary; Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Chairman of the Conservative Eurosceptic faction of the European Research Group; Dominic Raab, the former Brexit Secretary; David Davis, his predecessor in the role; and Iain Duncan Smith, the former party leader.

Also in attendance were Brandon Lewis, the Tory Chairman, Julian Smith, the Chief Whip, and Stephen Barclay, the Brexit Secretary.

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Afterwards, a No 10 spokesman issued a short statement, saying: “The PM and a number of Government ministers met today at Chequers for lengthy talks with senior colleagues about delivering Brexit. The meeting discussed a range of issues, including whether there is sufficient support in the Commons to bring back a meaningful vote this week.”

The continuing Tory turmoil followed a march for a People’s Vote in London on Saturday, which organisers estimated had involved around one million people, and as the online petition to scrap Brexit altogether topped five million signatures.

This morning Mrs May is expected to have a showdown with her critics when she chairs what will be a fiery emergency Cabinet meeting in Downing St to see if she can save her deal.

Later, she will give a Commons statement on last week’s European Council when the EU27 seized control of the Brexit timetable, giving Britain a delayed exit day of May 22 if MPs passed the PM’s plan this week or April 12 if they did not.

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Following the statement, MPs will take part in another “next steps” debate and are expected to vote on an amendment tabled by Labour’s Hilary Benn and the Conservatives’ Oliver Letwin to enable so-called “indicative votes” on various Brexit alternatives to take place on Wednesday; such a move was defeated by just two votes last week but seems almost certain to get through this time round.

The alternative options will include a Norway-style deal, a Canada-style trade deal, a People’s Vote, a no-deal and revocation.

However, Mr Barclay cast doubt that the Government would accept any option that received a majority, stressing it “would not be binding” legally and that potentially it could cause a “constitutional collision” with the Tory manifesto.

He explained such a scenario could risk sparking a general election if Parliament instructed the Government to “do something it was not elected to do”.

Last week’s politically turbulent week appears for some to have shifted the landscape dramatically and yet the PM faces a potentially even more fraught one this week given the backdrop now of MPs openly calling for her to resign. The financial markets could see sterling take a tumble.

One Cabinet minister said: “The end is nigh. She won’t be PM in 10 days’ time” while another noted how her judgement had “started to go haywire”.

In one remarkable development, a senior whip was said to have told Mrs May to her face that she should go because she was “betraying Brexit” and “destroying our party”.

Nicky Morgan, the pro-EU former Education Secretary, urged ministers to tell the PM "it's time to go" while leading Brexiteer Steve Baker said potential leadership contenders in the Government should "act now".

George Freeman, Mrs May's former policy adviser claimed it was "all over for the PM", tweeting: "She's done her best. But across country you can see anger. Everyone feels betrayed. Government's gridlocked. Trust in democracy collapsing. This can't go on. We need new PM who can reach out [and] build some sort of coalition for Plan B."

Philip Hammond hit back. The Chancellor decried colleagues for their disloyalty, telling Sky News’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday: "We have just over two weeks to complete this process before we get to April 12, the new deadline the Council has set last week. To be talking about changing the players on the board frankly is self-indulgent at this time."

He went on: "Changing prime minister wouldn't help us, changing the party in Government wouldn't help us: we've got to address the question of what type of Brexit is acceptable to Parliament, what type of way forward Parliament can agree on so that we can avoid what would be an economic catastrophe of a no-deal exit and also what would be a very big challenge to confidence in our political system if we didn't exit at all."

While he stressed he continued to support the PM’s deal, Mr Hammond also said that MPs had to look to compromise on the way forward and, interestingly, described a second EU poll as a “perfectly coherent proposition”.

Mr Duncan Smith possibly gave Mrs May a reason to hope her deal might sneak through when the Scot, who has twice voted against it, said he was “keeping my options open”.

The former party leader also decried those Cabinet ministers briefing against the PM, saying it was “appalling” and “disgusting” and suggested they should be sacked.

Lord Howard, another ex-Tory leader, who has opposed Mrs May’s deal, said he had now reluctantly concluded that, on an assessment of risk, he was supporting it because if it did not go through, then the country would be faced with a withdrawal “much further away from the kind of Brexit I want…and possibly even no Brexit at all”.

One Scottish Tory MP stressed that the Chequers meeting was crucial as getting Mrs May’s deal through at the third attempt would only happen with the support of Brexiteers and Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionists.

“She may have to state very clearly what her timetable is for stepping down before they will even begin to consider voting for the agreement. She can still be PM and get the Withdrawal Agreement and Bill away but it’s pretty clear to me that she is going to have to step down from the leadership so that the Government can be reset for the next phase of the negotiations.”

He added: “I’d like her to be allowed the respect of leaving office with dignity; she deserves that.”