Sky host Adam Boulton was determined to vouch for the idea of a second referendum but Mr Duncan Smith adamantly rejected it – and in so doing explain where the Tory government had failed most miserably over Brexit. He blasted: “The public voted to leave and we’ve always said Article 50 was very clear – you leave with a deal or without a deal. But we were meant to leave on March 29.

“The biggest mistake that has been made is to try and take no deal off the table.

“Because no deal is integral to Article 50 – it’s there, it’s absolutely clear that you leave on a set date.

“What you do in the meantime before you get there, is up to you and the EU.

“So the ball is as much in the EU’s court here as it will be in ours.”

Theresa May has urged Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn to compromise and back her Brexit deal after the proposals received a hostile response from critics on her own side.

The Prime Minister’s deal, which opens up the possibility of a second referendum, was described as “dead on arrival”, with the prospect of a larger Tory revolt than her previous failed attempt to get a Brexit agreement through Parliament.

Leadership rivals Boris Johnson and Dominic Raab were among Tories who backed Mrs May’s deal in March but have vowed to oppose the Withdrawal Agreement Bill (WAB).

Rejection of the WAB would heap further pressure on Mrs May to quit immediately, but some Tories called on her to go now without even risking the humiliation of a fourth Commons defeat on Brexit.

Mrs May, who will face the Commons on Wednesday, hopes her 10-point compromise plan will woo enough Labour and DUP MPs to make up for Tory Eurosceptics who are implacably opposed to her deal.

In a letter to Mr Corbyn, she highlighted the tests he had set at the start of the failed process to reach a cross-party agreement and insisted that the proposals would hold “for the remainder of this parliament” – a reference to his concerns that her successor could unpick a deal.

She told him: “I have shown … that I am willing to compromise to deliver Brexit for the British people.

“The WAB is our last chance to do so. I ask you to compromise too so that we can deliver what both our parties promised in our manifestos and restore faith in our politics.”

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