After more than five hours of being locked away with her Cabinet, Prime Minister Theresa May emerged from her office and in less than five minutes announced she’d wrested their backing for her Brexit deal.

But there was no joy in her voice. Indeed her words, the tone of the delivery, only goes to show how hard-won a victory it was and she gave a sense that it came at some cost. More battles lie ahead: “The choice before us is clear: This deal,” she said “or leave with no deal, or no Brexit at all.”

“I know that there will be difficult days,” she warned. “This is a decision that will come under intense scrutiny and that is entirely as it should be and entirely understandable.”

She mentioned it was a “collective” decision, a careful choice of words that implies it was not unanimous. Some fervent Brexit believers in her Cabinet might decide they must resign in protest, following in the footsteps of colleagues David Davis and Boris Johnson.

“But if I may end by just saying this: I believe that what I owe to this country is to take decisions that are in the national interest. And I firmly believe with my head and my heart that this is a decision which is in the best interests of our entire United Kingdom."

And with that, she turned on her heels and went back into 10 Downing Street.