Yet again tonight, it is clear that the whole future of the whole potential breakthrough around the Withdrawal Deal between the UK and the EU, is being blocked by the Northern Irish rump that is the DUP.  What is it about the British commentariat that it is abjectly failing to even consider never mind highlight the extent to which the lives of ordinary Britons on the island of Britain are being gambled by this small no. of anti-democratic zealots isolated away in Northern Ireland. Why is the media there not absolutely up in arms on nights like this?

Theresa May to Resign

Theresa May told the Tory 1922 Committee that she will stand aside if her deal is accepted. This prompted all sorts of suggestions about those who might be in line for a leadership contest.  The possibility also that there will be a general election.

The only problem she has, is that the DUP has already come out and said they will not support the deal.

The ERG has also had it’s own meeting today and one of their members Steve Baker referred to those within their group who have now decided they will vote for the deal as Fools and Knaves and Cowards.

Today is being described as another historic day in the British house of commons.

 

While a couple of these indicative votes may have been only narrowly defeated (such as option M above), none were accepted either. But this is being interpreted as a clue towards something which may command a majority.

The Scottish parliament has voted overwhelmingly today to cancel Brexit altogether. It is therefore taking full advantage of the disarray in Westminster.

A statutory instrument has also been passed by the House of Commons tonight preventing a “No Deal” Brexit.

Footnote:  The Speaker of the House has also reiterated that he may not even allow a third vote on the withdrawal agreement – Meaningful Vote 3 (MV3).

 

Unless Theresa May allows a free vote tomorrow in the indicative votes, there is a strong likelihood there will be mass resignations from the Cabinet.

The Duplicitous DUP have somehow all of a sudden now decided that their best bet is to kick the can down the road for up to a year rather than exit without a deal or vote for the PM’s deal.

This sets them on a different course to the ERG group who have reportedly now started to back Theresa May’s Withdrawal agreement rather than risk losing their precious Brexit altogether. The gobshites. They’ve clearly all now realised after the fact, that their old school strategy of intransigent oul politicking has probably completely back-fired, to the extent that they may now have lost out on the one chance they had of getting any form of bloody Brexit through at all. Serves them right.

54% of voters in Britain are now in favour of remain versus 46% are in favour of leave. This statistic was released today by the National Centre for social research. 58% of voters also believe the economy will be adversely effected by Brexit.

I also love the comparison in the following piece by the Guardian, comparing Brexit like the divorce where the adulterer is force to return home because they have nowhere else to go.

22:45pm.  The parliament tonight has voted tonight by 329 – 302 in favour of the Oliver Letwin amendment which allows Parliament to take control of the Commons order paper this Wednesday. 3 ministers have resigned in order vote against the Government. The scale of the defeat has been a further embarrassment for the Government.

The theory is that this could be the thin end of the wedge which could eventually lead to the back-benchers shoving through a second referendum. The ERG and the DUP are seen to have completely over-played their hands. The Government is now seen as being out of control of the Brexit process from this Wednesday.

The Government had hoped that by offering a series of indicative votes this situation could have been avoided. However while she was giving Parliament the possibility of those votes, she was also saying she may not give any weight to their outcomes. Therefore the back-benchers decided they had no choice but to take this action.

Nonetheless, the PM has reaffirmed her position that she will not go against the Parliamentary majority which oppose No Deal.

Their only problem remains that all this is that, while there is a possibility of house majority support for certain options through a series of indicative votes, once Parliament has approved something, the EU may not approve of whatever passes through Westminster.

 

The most notable emotion about today’s developments on Brexit is simply… bewilderment.

It is simply unbelievable what a total mess the whole thing has become. In order to be able to review the proceedings at a later time this link to tonight’s Guardian feed is probably the most valuable information source.

The whole thing seems to be teetering out of control with the most ardent Brexiteer political beasts all looking for the best spot on the titanic for their super-sized deck chairs as they take pot shots at their own Prime Minister. And she powerless to say or do anything to make them come to their senses.

It’s like a bad episode of some sort of Train Crash TV – we can all see the direction it’s moving in but we’re all utterly incapable of doing anything about it.

Included in the criticism of the current situation are points to do with –

a.  How a Chequers think-tank meeting yesterday was full male stale and pale tories.

b.  How Civil Servants in the UK are all taking notes of everything that happens in anticipation of a public enquiry into how the whole thing unfolded – such as the number of mentions at cabinet meetings of how events might be damaging to the “Conservative Party” as opposed to the country.

Unbelievable. But the possibility remains that the options for the Hard Brexiteers will amount to Deal or No Deal – albeit that they will almost certainly now take effect on the 12th of April as opposed to 29th March. Er.. I think.

 

 

There aren’t many people expressing much or any sympathy for Theresa May as she faces into an entirely unenviable week.  The reasons they don’t are as follows:

• She’s accused of setting unreasonable red lines for the Brexit process.
• It’s pointed out she failed to reach across the parliamentary aisle in any meaningful way
• The timeline for Brexit was said to be too tight.
• The speech she made during the week was accused of crossing the line between intransigence over to megalomania.
• Personally, I believe she completely underestimated the negotiating style of the DUP – she seemed to be outright unaware of the potential obstruction to progress they are used to being.
• She behaved as if she was in a majority government despite the fact she was so weak.

Therefore it’s more likely that she was incompetent more than tactically playing a brilliant long game which many would have hoped she was doing.

Where she and her Government find themselves this weekend is that she is unlikely to make it through the next 10 days as Prime Minister.

The proposals highlighted in the newspapers today are suggesting that there are two possible successors being put forward;

• David Liddington – Theresa May’s de facto deputy PM
• Michael Gove – A possible compromise candidate…

The coming week is likely to be even more dramatic than last week;

• If the Meaningful Vote happens, it’s likely to be defeated.
• On Wednesday parliament is likely to take over the agenda of the Parliament.
• There may be an attempt by either side of the Tory Party to displace the PM if this morning’s papers are to be believed.
• The petition of signatures demanding a second referendum is likely to climb to even higher numbers of signatures.

 

 

And here’s one that’s really a turn up for the books…

Sky’s chief Political correspondent Adam Boulton writes a remoaning article for Sky News feed – what’s going on with that?

So is the scales tipping over into more positive territory? There have been over 3.7 million signatures by now to the online petition for a 2nd referendum.

That’s all a little hard to ignore.

And here’s the Channel 4’s treatment of the same subject –

Legally, the date for the exit is no longer next Friday 29th March on the basis of the acceptance of the EU27 last night that the article 50 can be extended.

It looks like a lot has been coming to a head in the past 3 days or so and that all seems to have taken shape in literally the last 24 hours:

• Theresa May’s mid-week “special statement” seems to have completely back-fired, causing MP’s who might have backed her deal, turned against her.
• She has now decided that she may not push for an MV3 if it is not seen as having the possibility of succeeding.
• The Hard Brexiteers seem to be completely turned against Theresa May by now, particularly the DUP making her deal very unlikely to pass.
• Therefore instead she seems to have decided to present 7 possible indicative votes as an alternative.
• It looks like Mrs. May is coming concerted pressure to fall on her own sword
• An EU stance that seems to have been quite sympathetic to the British position looks to have been well judged, piling the pressure back on the British political system.
• The British public seems to be absolutely turned off the whole debacle and there seems to be an appetite just to get back to normal.
• The sense is that the British are at last realising the loss of credibility they have suffered internationally.
• The EU seems also to be sick and tired of the whole issue and is now also ready to move on to other issues.

This podcast is an expert analysis from Cicero Group of where things lie at the end of this week and the possible timeline for next week.

While there is still no guarantee that the Speaker of the House will allow the Meaningful Vote 3 happen, there is more and more of an assumption that there will be a change in circumstances surrounding the vote – arising from the Council of European Ministers meeting tonight. Already (20:30) there looks to be a shift in position in the EU27 basically removing the condition that the extension to Article 50 will only be allowed on condition that the Withdrawal Deal is accepted – they’re now saying they will allow a long decision if the Withdrawal Deal gets defeated and a short one if it passes.

Leo Varadkar appears tonight on TV reiterating the Irish position that no-one wants no deal.

April 11th has come up now as a date by which the UK must decide whether it wants to contest the EU elections. If it is decided that it will contest those elections, a further long extension would be given.

All the indications from all of this is that the EU looks to be dangling a carrot in front of the UK that the Brexit misery could end if they opt to reject the deal and extend their involvement in the EU.

A petition meanwhile in the UK has attracted 1m signatures. Not significant in it’s own right in that it doesn’t have any potential influence on parliament. Yet.

 

 

The following is the text of the letter from Theresa May to the EU requesting an extension to Article 50;

Dear Donald

The UK Government’s policy remains to leave the European Union in an orderly manner on the basis of the Withdrawal Agreement and Political Declaration agreed in November, complemented by the Joint Instrument and supplement to the Political Declaration President Juncker and I agreed on 11 March.

You will be aware that before the House of Commons rejected the deal for a second time on 12 March, I warned in a speech in Grimsby that the consequences of failing to endorse the deal were unpredictable and potentially deeply unpalatable.

The House of Commons did not vote in favour of the deal. The following day it voted against leaving the EU without a negotiated deal. The day after that it supported a Government motion that proposed a short extension to the Article 50 period if the House supported a meaningful vote before this week’s European Council.

The motion also made clear that if this had not happened, a longer extension would oblige the UK to call elections to the European Parliament. I do not believe that it would be in either of our interests for the UK to hold European Parliament elections.

I had intended to bring the vote back to the House of Commons this week. The Speaker of the House of Commons said on Monday that in order for a further meaningful vote to be brought back to the House of Commons, the agreement would have to be “fundamentally different—not different in terms of wording, but different in terms of substance”.

Some Members of Parliament have interpreted that this means a further change to the deal. This position has made it impossible in practice to call a further vote in advance of the European Council. However, it remains my intention to bring the deal back to the House.

In advance of that vote, I would be grateful if the European Council could therefore approve the supplementary documents that President Juncker and I agreed in Strasbourg, putting the Government in a position to bring these agreements to the House and confirming the changes to the Government’s proposition to Parliament.

I also intend to bring forward further domestic proposals that confirm my previous commitments to protect our internal market, given the concerns expressed about the backstop.

On this basis, and in the light of the outcome of the European Council, I intend to put forward a motion as soon as possible under section 13 of the Withdrawal Act 2018 and make the argument for the orderly withdrawal and strong future partnership the UK economy, its citizens’ security and the continent’s future, demands.

If the motion is passed, I am confident that Parliament will proceed to ratify the deal constructively. But this will clearly not be completed before 29 March 2019. In our legal system, the Government will need to take a Bill through both Houses of Parliament to enact our commitments under the Withdrawal Agreement into domestic law.

While we will consult with the Opposition in the usual way to plan the passage of the Bill as quickly and smoothly as possible, the timetable for this is inevitably uncertain at this stage.

I am therefore writing to inform the European Council that the UK is seeking an extension to the Article 50 period under Article 50(3) of the Treaty on European Union, including as applied by Article 106a of the Euratom Treaty, until 30 June 2019.

I would be grateful for the opportunity to set out this position to our colleagues on Thursday.

Yours ever

The PM has gone on tonight to release a statement to the UK electorate ;

Following this speech, one MP has stated that MP’s across the house have been subject to death threats “some of them credible”, and that if any of them come to any harm, she will have to take some responsibility for it.

There is also a report today that NHS Trusts are already experiencing unprecedented drug shortages – undeniably already related to Brexit – before it has even happened.

The Daily Mail is running a headline for tomorrow about the 1,000 days since the Brexit referendum. While another headline in the Times claims that May is “pleading” for an extension from the EU. Every day there is that unnerving sense that the seeds of some sort of dystopian nightmare are possibly being sown before our very media craving eyes. The wonder is whether anyone, or any body, or anything is actually in control of this?

It’s interesting to consider what the EU must be feeling right now given the Speaker of the House decision to prevent MV3. They could be thinking that this puts the British Parliament in a wholly unenviable position which be extension gives them a stronger hand. The only worry is that the phase of the game which allowed them to play tough on not offering any extra wriggle room for TM is now over. And that phase is being replaced by a potentially more worrying stage when the EU27 may not be able to agree on the extent, the length or the conditions attached to any potential extension.

Is anyone considering what the risks of such delays might be? The above clip is of the Speaker being confronted on the street by reporters – clearly unnerved by it. Not something I could say I’ve ever seen before. Such events contribute to the sense of overall chaos. What would be stopping this from ratcheting up considerably if there was to be even more onerous hurdles placed in the way of Brexit ever occurring, or making a disorderly Brexit even more inevitable.

The reports this evening are that Theresa May was going into a cabinet meeting hoping to get a 9 month delay to Brexit, however she was ambushed spectacularly by a group of hard Brexiteers saying that they won’t stand for it and that the Conservative Party won’t stand for it. The ambush included threats of resignations.

 

 

As semi predicted, the Speaker of the House has now decided that the House can not now hold the MV3 vote. This technicality dates back hundreds of years and it’s designed to ensure that the Government is listening to the commons. The same vote cannot been held more than once in the same parliamentary session without substantial changes made to it.

In a TV interview today, the Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said with no small amount of sarcasm that Mrs. May reminds him of the Monty Python character the Black Knight who always triumphs – even though he’s had both his arms and one of his legs chopped off. She keeps on just carrying on, he probably has a point.

Nonetheless, the step the Speaker has taken, is actually being hailed by both Brexiteers and Remainers as favouring them. The Government however is unimpressed, with one of the possible outcomes predicted as a much longer extension.

The DUP stub tail is also still wagging the Great Britain dog..