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Brexit: May tells MPs she does not have enough support to win third meaningful vote – live news
Brexit: May tells MPs she does not have enough support to win third meaningful vote – live news
(31 minutes later)
Labour’s Rachel Reeves asks May to confirm that, if she does not get her deal passed by 12 April, she will seek a longer extension of article 50.
May says she cannot say that she will accept anything that comes up in parliament. All MPs have a duty to deliver on the manifestos on which they were elected, she says.
Mark Francois, the Tory Brexiter, says May told MPs from the despatch box on 108 occasions that the UK would leave the UK on 29 March. Now the chancellor has opened the door to a second referendum. Has she told him that she does not accept this idea?
May says she has not changed her mind on this. She believes MPs must accept the result of the first referendum.
Nigel Dodds, the DUP leader at Westminster, says May seems to be arguing for the first time that the UK needs extra time to prepare for a no-deal Brexit. Why? And he says Leo Varadkar and Michel Barnier have both said there would be no border checks in Ireland in the event of a no-deal Brexit. Why did May agree to it in the first place?
May says, when you look at the detail of what the EU has said, it is clear that EU law says checks would need to be applied.
Yvette Cooper, the Labour MP, asks if May is ruling out negotiating the UK joining a customs union with the EU.
May says there are a number of questions that MPs need to address. What rules would the UK abide by? Would it have to abide by state aid rules? Would it have to accept free movement? She says her manifesto ruled out a customs union. She thinks it is very important for the UK to be able to strike its own trade deals.
May suggests she would not accept customs union membership even if MPs were to vote in favour.
Theresa Villiers, the Tory Brexiter, asks what would happen at the Irish border in the event of a no-deal Brexit.
May says a statement issued by the EU today says that, in the event of a no-deal Brexit, all EU laws would have to be complied with.
Labour’s Hilary Benn, the chair of the Brexit committee, says if May does not hold a vote this week, the UK will either have to leave the EU on 12 April, or apply for another extension. What will she do?
May says she did say there is not enough support for another meaningful vote at the moment. But she still hopes to get that support, she says.
Ian Blackford, the SNP leader at Westminster, says people are embarrassed by this government.
He asks if May will respect the will of parliament and reject no deal.
May says Blackford should accept that the people of Scotland voted to remain in the UK.
She says votes in the Commons count. But so do the votes of the 17.4m people who voted to leave the EU.
May is responding to Corbyn.
She says she gave Corbyn an advance text of her statement. In it, she says she cannot commit to accept the result of anything decided in indicative votes.
She says no MP can commit to accepting something that contradicts the manifesto on which they were elected.
And MPs have a duty to respect the result of the referendum, she says.
Referring to the fact that “a number of people” marched on Saturday, May says Corbyn’s deputy, Tom Watson, went on the march. Corbyn normally goes on marches himself. But he did not on Saturday. Perhaps he was present but not involved, she says.
Jeremy Corbyn says the government’s approach to Brexit has become “a national embarrassment”.
He says last week’s EU summit was another negotiating failure for May.
He says she requested a short extension of article 50, even though David Lidington said that would be “reckless”.
He says it was “irresponsible” and “dangerous” for May to pit parliament against the people in her speech last week.
People are frustrated, he says. He says it is no surprise that people marched against the government. Even leavers are frustrated, he says.
He says May’s deal is dead.
He says May has united the CBI and the TUC against her deal.
He says it is time for parliament to take control. That is why Labour will back the Letwin amendment.
He says the speaker said there would have to be significant changes for a third meaningful vote. But there are no significant changes, she says.
He says May should not block attempts by MPs to find an alternative way forward.
Will May accept any decision by MPs?
He says Labour would support a public vote to block no deal or a chaotic Tory deal.
It is time for parliament to work together on a plan B, he says.
May says this is her first address to MPs since her speech on Wednesday last week, when she blamed them for blocking Brexit.
May says this is her first address to MPs since her speech on Wednesday last week, when she blamed them for blocking Brexit.
She says she was expressing her frustrations. She says she knows MPs are doing their jobs, and she respects the fact that people have strong views on both sides.
She says she was expressing her frustrations. She says she knows MPs are doing their jobs, and she respects the fact that people have strong views on both sides.
May says the government is opposed to the Letwin amendment.
May says the government is opposed to the Letwin amendment.
She says the government remains committed to trying to see if a Commons consensus can be reached if her deal is not passed.
She says the government remains committed to trying to see if a Commons consensus can be reached if her deal is not passed.
But she says she is “sceptical” of this process. In the past when this procedure has been tried, it has produced contradictory conclusions, or no conclusions at all.
But she says she is “sceptical” of this process. In the past when this procedure has been tried, it has produced contradictory conclusions, or no conclusions at all.
May says she is “sceptical” about whether allowing MPs indicative votes will produce a decision.
May says she is “sceptical” about whether allowing MPs indicative votes will produce a decision.
Theresa May is now making her Commons statement on Brexit and last week’s EU summit.
She starts by referring to her letter to Donald Tusk requesting a short article 50 extension.
She says she wanted the UK to be able to leave the EU on 29 March.
But she says she was conscious of the need to protect the union, and of the damage that a no-deal Brexit could do in Northern Ireland, where there is no executive able to take steps to minimise the risk.
She sums up the offer from the EU.
She says the government has today laid the statutory instrument changing Brexit date.
Brexit date has already changed under international, she says. She says if MPs fail to pass the statutory instrument, that will create legal uncertainty. But it won’t change the internationally-recognised Brexit date.
May says she does not yet have enough support to win a third meaningful vote.
I asked Labour why Jeremy Corbyn was opposed to splitting the votes on the withdrawal agreement and the political declaration. (See 3.06pm.) A party source said Labour would not back something giving “zero clarity” about the future, which is why it wants its changes to the political declaration written into law.
Andy Shaw, a reader, has got an even more specific answer.
@AndrewSparrow re: 15:06 "The Labour statement does not explain why Corbyn refused to separate [the WA and PD]." Surely because the EU Withdrawal Act (s13(1)) explicitly requires the two to be voted on together?
He is right. The relevant part of the act is here.
And Politics.co.uk’s Ian Dunt is good on this too.
Think Corbyn is right on this. The future relationship document dictates the likelihood of the backstop coming into force. Without it, you cannot calculate the danger of the withdrawal agreement. https://t.co/AtbkLWEF1w
This is from my colleague Jessica Elgot.
New - Understand PM is likely to say that as yet, there is not enough support to hold a third meaningful vote. Statement from May in the House of Commons at 3.30.
Two more questions from BTL.
@andrew Do any sources suggest that the demo or the petition were discussed in cabinet?
This was raised at the Number 10 lobby briefing and, although the prime minister’s spokesman did not say exactly what was said about the march and the petition, he did not give the impression that a lot of time was spent discussing them, or that they are having much impact on the government’s thinking. The spokesman accepted that there were “strongly-held views” on Brexit on both sides. But he said the PM’s view was that the country had staged a “very large democratic exercise” and voted to leave, and that MPs had to honour this.
@Andrew
Why is No. 10 saying that MV3 might not happen this week when the E.U. statement made it clear that it must happen this week and otherwise the May 22nd date is gone and the only options then left are either no deal or a Monty Python type "now for something completely different" plan by April 12th?
The EU offer is less blunt than that. Read what Donald Tusk, the president of the European council, said late on Thursday night (my bold text.)
In the first scenario, that is, if the withdrawal agreement is passed by the House of Commons next week, the European Council agrees to an extension until the 22nd of May.
In the second scenario, that is, if the withdrawal agreement is not approved by the House of Commons next week, the European Council agrees to an extension until the 12th of April, while expecting the United Kingdom to indicate a way forward. What this means in practice is that, until that date, all options will remain open, and the cliff-edge date will be delayed.
The UK government will still have a choice of a deal, no-deal, a long extension or revoking article 50.
This implies that if the UK were to pass the deal next week, and then request an extension of article 50 from 12 April until 22 May, that might be feasible.
The Labour party has just released this statement about Jeremy Corbyn’s meeting with Theresa May at lunchtime. A spokesman said:
Jeremy Corbyn and Theresa May met for over an hour in parliament and had a frank and comprehensive exchange of views.
Jeremy Corbyn made clear there was no basis for bringing back the meaningful vote on Theresa May’s deal for a third time.
The Labour leader did not accept the prime minister’s suggestion that the withdrawal agreement could be separated from the political declaration.
This is more revealing than these meeting read-out statements often are. Here are the two key lines.
Theresa May is considering asking MPs to vote on the withdrawal agreement separately from the political declaration, Labour has revealed. Until now May has treated them both as a package, and MPs have been asked to vote on both together (eg, in the motion for MV2). But the EU summit communique issued last week said that, for the UK to get Brexit extended until 22 May, MPs just had to pass the withdrawal agreement. The EU statement did not mention the political declaration in the context of a vote this week. This is significant because there is little in the withdrawal agreement (which focuses on the transition, the £39bn payment and the backstop) that Labour objects to; most of Labour’s objections to May’s deal relate to the political declaration. The Labour statement does not explain why Corbyn refused to separate the two issues.
Corbyn told May she should abandon the third meaningful votes.
Corbyn was joined at the meeting by Sir Keir Starmer, the shadow Brexit secretary, and Nick Brown, the Labour chief whip. May was supported by Stephen Barclay, the Brexit secretary, and Julian Smith, the government chief whip.
The Labour team came away with the clear impression that the government would not be bound by any decision of parliament in indicative votes. That is what Liam Fox, the international trade secretary, suggested this morning too.
Here is the Financial Times’ political editor, George Parker, on the choice facing Theresa May.
Big decision facing @theresa_may in next few hours. Many ERG MPs ready to back her deal tomorrow if she sets timetable for her departure, but maybe not enough? The PM will only drop the "R-bomb" if she's sure it will secure victory. DUP don't want to jump first. Mexican standoff!
Last month George Eustice resigned as fisheries minister because he was opposed to Theresa May’s willingness to contemplate extending article 50. He is seen as a relative hardliner on Brexiter - he once stood as a Ukip candidate - but in an interview with Radio 5 Live’s Emma Barnett this morning he said he favoured the Norway option. He explained:
The right settlement is somewhere in the space of what’s called the Norway option. It’s the European free trade association. The UK actually invented it in 1959, and we built a coalition of countries, including Norway, but in those days also Austria, Portugal and Sweden and others too.
And I think we should rely on existing legal rights under what’s called the EEA treaty, that’s the European Economic Area, like Norway – but leave the European Union as soon as we can, and effectively become an Efta state, an Efta member instead. That gives us a close economic tie with the European Union - but gives us our independence back.
Eustice also said he thought a majority of MPs would “get behind a variant of the Norway option”.
(But would Efta want the UK as a member? On Friday the prime minister of Iceland, one of the Efta countries, didn’t sound too keen.)
James Forsyth and Katy Balls have a useful cabinet write-up at the Spectator. Here’s an extract.
May also appears to be moving more firmly towards ruling out no deal. One minister says that it is the ‘the first time she has said it so definitively’. This minister says that ‘it is the issue of the union seems to be what has really convinced her’ of this.
On the World at One the housing minister Kit Malthouse dismissed the Letwin plan for indicative votes on Brexit, echoing what Number 10 said about it earlier. (See 1.28pm.) Matlhouse said:
I hope members across the house realise that it has significantly detrimental constitutional implications and will vote it down so that we can continue with an orderly, iterative process of reaching consensus across the house rather than a kind of X Factor.
