THERESA May has confirmed that she will not lead the Tories into the 2022 General Election as Brexiteer colleagues continued to call for her to go following this week’s confidence vote in her leadership.

After arriving in Brussels to seek “further assurances” from her fellow EU leaders on the Irish backstop, the Prime Minister, weakened further by Wednesday’s vote, was again faced with questions about her own future.

She said: “In my heart, I would love to be able to lead the Conservative Party into the next General Election but it is right that the party feels it would prefer to go into that election with a new leader.

“People try to talk about dates; what I’m clear about is the next General Election is in 2022 and it’s right another party leader takes us into that general election and my focus now is on ensuring that I can get those assurances that we need to get this deal over the line."

Asked for a response to opposition claims that she was now a “lame duck prime minister,” No 10 simply referred journalists to the PM’s Downing St remarks on Wednesday night following the vote of Tory MPs when she acknowledged there had been a significant number of colleagues who had voted against her but stressed the need to get on with the job of securing a good Brexit deal for the country.

Her 200-117 victory indicated the Conservative leader had lost the confidence of a third of her MPs and more than half of her backbenchers.

Crucially, the size of the rebellion makes getting her Brexit deal through the Commons an even unlikelier prospect as the opposing numbers to it are now as high as 439 while her supporters in the Tory Party number just 200.

Dominic Raab, the former Brexit Secretary, revealed he had voted against the PM and insisted, despite the vote, she needed to be replaced, noting how it was “very difficult to see how this Prime Minister can lead us forward”.

The Brexiteer, tipped as a potential contender to replace Mrs May, told the BBC: “We will have to back her as best we can. But the problem is that both in relation to Brexit and the wider sustainability of the Government, the given likelihood of any changes to the deal, given the likely scale of opposition, it looks very difficult to see how this Prime Minister can lead us forward.”

He later told Sky News: “My biggest fear now is that if she continues in place, we have a greater risk of a Jeremy Corbyn government”.

Jacob Rees-Mogg, who chairs the anti-EU European Research Group[ERG], claimed it was "not impossible" that, on reflection, Mrs May would decide to stand aside.

"You may remember that Margaret Thatcher... said: 'We fight on, we fight to win.' Nobody was tougher than Mrs Thatcher and the next day she resigned. So, it's not impossible.

“Theresa May should consider what she said last night. I agree with her that we do want somebody who can unite the country and the Conservative Party and she has to ask herself is she realistically that person?"

Fellow Leaver Richard Drax said the party needed a Brexiteer as leader, telling ITV1's Good Morning Britain: "I would suggest, were the Prime Minister thinking carefully this morning, she would offer her resignation and allow someone who can deliver this to take over."

But Conservative Remainer Sarah Wollaston, argued that replacing Mrs May with one of the Brexiteers’ favourites would not enable the ERG to get their version of Brexit through the Commons.

"A new leader won't change the maths of this place, that's the point here," she said.