Well, well, well. Just when you thought British politics couldn’t get any stranger, here we are. We are truly through the Brexit looking glass now. Last night 432 MPs on both sides including Brexiteers and Remainers, voted against the Brexit deal that Theresa May has been able to broker with the EU. It was a record-breaking defeat, the biggest suffered by any government since 1924.
But, here’s the thing, everyone saw it coming a mile off, even the Prime Minister herself. May herself then confidently invited a vote of no confidence in her own government and then, predictably, one came from Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn.
The Prime Minister, who lost her majority in the 2017 election, lost her Brexit deal but insisted that her deal was ‘better than no deal’ despite the fact she’s been repeating the phrase ‘no deal is better than a bad deal’ like a parrot to appease the hard line Brexiteers in her party over the last year and a bit.
Almost every week is an ‘extraordinary week in Britain’, to quote a familiar refrain of commentators, leaving us with ‘unanswered questions about Britain’s future’ so, what does actually happen now?
In a nutshell, Parliament is now totally deadlocked. So badly so, that this will go down in history. We’re in a mess and there is no clear way forward. However, there are a few things that will definitely happen because of parliamentary protocol and there are a few potential outcomes.
No-confidence vote
First up, there will be an emergency debate under the Fixed-term Parliament Act taking place all day today in the House of Commons which has completely cleared its schedule. This will conclude with the vote of no-confidence at 7pm tonight.
Corbyn thinks he can win this vote, but the government are confident that they will win it because of their agreement with the DUP.
Plan B
Assuming the government does win, Theresa May will continue as Prime Minister. She will have to present a plan B which she hinted yesterday would involve working on more ‘creative solutions’ to the Irish backstop (which means a customs and regulatory border between Ireland, which is in the EU, and Northern Ireland which is part of the UK post-Brexit).
May has also said she will immediately start talks with her own party and members of others ‘in a constructive spirit’. It’s worth noting, though, that the EU have made it quite clear they’ve had enough and show no signs of backing down. So, who knows whether they would offer Britain any more than they already have.
In a statement last night, Jean-Claude, the President of the European Commission, said:
‘The risk of a disorderly withdrawal … has increased with this evening’s vote’ and added ‘Time is almost up.’
Two weeks to get it together
However, if Labour did win then we find ourselves, once again, in unchartered territory. This scenario wouldn’t actually mean that there would be an immediate election. No, instead May would have two weeks to regain the confidence of MPs.
At the end of the two weeks there would be another confidence vote. If government cannot be formed, there would an election would be triggered. Again, this would not be immediate but in 25 working days, the period required under the Electoral Registration and Administration Act. This would take us to mid-February.
Corbyn could also try to form a government. He’d need to be able to form a majority which would be tricky as he wouldn’t get support from Conservative MPs or the DUP.
Ticking clock
As we discuss these potential scenarios, there is an elephant in the room. Ticking ominously in the background is a huge Brexit clock. Theresa May triggered Article 50 in 2017 which gave us two years to come up with a deal and agree it. This means we have 73 days and counting left until the end of that process, so a deal must be reached, or Britain will finally crash out of the EU with no deal.
May has already said that she will not fight an election in 2022, so it is possible that she will step down if she loses the vote tonight. Her own party cannot stage another vote of no confidence in her for 12 months because of the one which failed at the end of 2018. However, Corbyn can keep tabling them for as long as he likes. In 1970, the Conservatives did this to Labour until they toppled the government.
So, where does that leave us?
The truth is the yesterday’s ‘meaningful vote’ in Parliament means further uncertainty. It confirmed what we already know which is that MPs cannot agree on Theresa May’s deal with the EU.
As Britain moves ever closer to the deadline stipulated by Article 50 for leaving the EU, we’re really no closer to resolving the situation than we were yesterday. However, you voted in the referendum, that’s a worrying fact.
Will Brexit even happen?
What all of this means for Brexit is as uncertain as it is for Theresa May. For Brexit to be stopped, MPs on both sides need to back another referendum but that’s not on the table right now and Corbyn didn’t mention it yesterday. If there is a general election one side would need to campaign to remain, which Corbyn has made absolutely no suggestion he would do, and win in order to stop Brexit.
The only thing that is certain, then, is uncertainty
Since the EU referendum of 2016, we’ve got used to a cycle of crisis, rinse, repeat in British politics. Initially, it was a bit uncomfortable, then it was somewhat troubling but then abnormal became the new normal, uncertainty the new certainty and confusion the new clarity.
Civil servants continue to stockpile medicine behind the scenes. Members of the ‘48% Preppers Brexit’ Facebook group raid supermarkets for tinned food. How will they teach all of this – the biggest crisis faced my Britain since the Second World War – to our kids in schools? What analogies will they use?
‘You see, it was a bit like the Hunger Games. Politicians fought to the death of their careers. It was a bit like The West Wing, except there were no truly inspirational leaders. Think Shakespeare’s Macbeth but with higher stakes and every scene ending with the repetitive line “no deal is better than a bad deal” until you fall asleep.’
The problem is that the parallels with fiction are all flawed. You really couldn’t make this up