THE leading Remainer Tory, Anna Soubry, has called on the Conservative Government to end its “macho” posturing and made clear no Tory MP was planning to defy Theresa May over the flagship EU Withdrawal Bill at its first Commons vote next week.

Over the weekend, Damian Green, the First Secretary of State, urged Conservative colleagues to support the Brexit legislation or risk letting Jeremy Corbyn into Downing Street.

Ms Soubry, a former Business minister, said: “I don't know any Conservative Member of Parliament that isn't going to vote for this Bill at Second Reading. I thought we had abandoned this sort of rather bullish, rather macho way of doing business over Brexit."

While the Second Reading starts on Thursday, the vote will be taken after the second day of debate on Monday.

With the Prime Minister relying on Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionists to attain a working majority of just 13 and with Labour making clear it could join the SNP and Liberal Democrats to vote against the legislation next week, Tory whips have been reminding Remain-supporting colleagues that anything but a vote for the Government could be seen as them supporting Mr Corbyn. Just seven Conservative MPs abstaining would deprive Mrs May of her majority.

But Ms Soubry said suggestions of a rebellion were "an absolute nonsense" as she called on her leader to build a consensus over Brexit.

She explained how she might support amendments to the bill as it made its way through Parliament, stressing that there was nothing "weird" or "treacherous" about scrutinising the Government's plans.

"What you're basically saying is that, for some reason, when it comes to Brexit, you stop doing your fundamental job as a Member of Parliament, which is to scrutinise legislation and if you need to add your name to amendments," Ms Soubry said.

"This is not revolutionary; all manner of people have been doing that quite properly for centuries and indeed there are a number of people now in government who've got a rather fine history of defying their Government in ways certainly the likes of me have never done.

"So there's nothing weird and there's certainly nothing treacherous about putting down amendments and then speaking to them and indeed voting on them; it's called democracy."

Ms Soubry also said she believed the PM was not aware of these briefings against Tory MPs.

"I very much hope that Theresa will take control of all these sorts of aspects, so that she makes sure that the way the Government is operating and this bullish, macho sort of attitude that if you don't fall into line and get behind something then somehow you're going to be thwarting the will of the people, that sort of rhetoric has got to stop," declared the Nottinghamshire MP.

"I know that she understands the need to build a consensus and that everything has changed since the General Election in June," she added.

Meanwhile, No 10 made clear Britain was ready to "intensify" the pace of negotiations over Brexit.

The comment came amid reports the UK wants to ditch the current pattern of negotiating for one week each month in Brussels and move to continuous talks.

It followed claims by Nick Clegg, the former Deputy Prime Minister, that talks were moving too slowly to be completed by the deadline of March 2019.

"It's a bit like staring at a building site and saying we've made progress because we've made a cup of tea," Mr Clegg told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

It has been suggested the Brexit Department requested rolling talks to begin on September 18 and continue until a breakthrough is achieved.

Asked about the prospect of stepping up the tempo of talks, the PM#s deputy spokeswoman said: "We are ready to intensify negotiations. Nothing has been formally agreed but that is something that we can discuss.

"Typically, with negotiations, as time goes on you see the pace pick up. Certainly we wouldn't rule that out but nothing has been agreed yet."