‘We’re all ready’: how Sunak’s push for Brexit deal set up his biggest leadership test

Rishi Sunak ‘appears on the brink of trying to face down the prospective critics’ of his deal on the Northern Ireland protocol. Photograph: Oli Scarff/AFP/Getty Images

Rishi Sunak has found out the hard way what it is like to become embroiled in the cycle of the Brexit forever wars. Despite desperate attempts to keep his party in line, a row that plagued his predecessors is at risk of erupting again over a reworking of the Northern Ireland protocol which he hopes to announce next week.

The wariness of some in government was betrayed by the foreign secretary, James Cleverly, who told a group of journalists at the start of the week – when momentum towards getting a deal on the protocol appeared to be stalling – that it would be announced at some point between “now and the end of time”.