Theresa May is set to take a seat in the House of Lords after revealing that she would be standing down as the Tory MP for Maidenhead earlier this year.

Lady May, as the 67-year-old former prime minister will now be known, occupied Downing Street from 2016 to 2019, a period of extraordinary tumult in British politics in the wake of the Brexit vote.

When she entered Number 10 in 2016, Lady May was seen as the “safe pair of hands”, expected to successfully negotiate a departure agreement with the European Union.

However, she proved unable to bridge the bitter divisions opened up within the Conservative Party and in the country at large by the referendum.

Having supported Remain – albeit with little visible enthusiasm – she was never fully trusted by Brexit ultras.

“I have done my best,” she said, but admitted it had not been enough.

Born in 1956 in Eastbourne, Theresa Brasier was the only child of Church of England clergyman Hugh Brasier and Zaidee Mary.

A studious, bookish girl, she grew up in rural Oxfordshire where, by her own admission, she was something of a “goody two shoes” – once confessing that the naughtiest thing she had done was to “run through fields of wheat” to the annoyance of local farmers.

There she met her future husband Philip May after they were introduced by Benazir Bhutto, the future prime minister of Pakistan.

After a grammar school education, she gained a place to read geography at St Hugh’s College, Oxford University.

Following graduation the couple, who married in 1980, both took jobs in banking, with Theresa May initially going to the Bank of England before becoming a financial consultant at the Association for Payment Clearing Services.

She secured her first elected position as a Tory councillor in the London Borough of Merton in 1986, going on to become chairman of education and deputy Conservative group leader.

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After twice standing unsuccessfully for Parliament, she finally won the newly created seat of Maidenhead in Berkshire in the 1997 general election only to see the Tories turfed out of office in a Labour landslide.

She nevertheless soon caught the eye of party leader William Hague who made her shadow spokeswoman for schools, disabled people and women, before promoting her to shadow education secretary.

When her Brexit plan was finally put to MPs in January 2019 it was defeated by a majority of 230 – the biggest government defeat in modern political history.

Two more votes followed with two more heavy defeats for the government and when talks with the Labour Party to find a cross-party way forward collapsed, she announced her resignation.

Despite the humiliating circumstances of her departure, Lady May chose to carry on as a backbench MP in Parliament, emerging as a periodic critic of her successor Boris Johnson including over the partygate scandal.

Detailing her exit from the Commons, Lady May said causes such as tackling modern slavery were taking an “increasing amount” of her time.

But her political legacy will chiefly be remembered as one dominated by wrangling over Brexit.