Prime minister says Commons has provided clear majority
against leaving the EU without a deal after MPs inflict fresh defeat. May had
promised MPs a free vote after her deal was heavily voted down for a second
time on Tuesday
against leaving the EU without a deal after MPs inflict fresh defeat. May had
promised MPs a free vote after her deal was heavily voted down for a second
time on Tuesday
• MPs reject no-deal Brexit by majority of 43 in second vote
May’s final warning to Tory rebels: back me or lose Brexit
PM signals she will put her deal to parliament again after
cabinet splits three ways and government defeated twice
Jessica Elgot, Rowena Mason and Heather Stewart
Wed 13 Mar 2019 21.50 GMT Last modified on Thu 14 Mar 2019
08.17 GMT
Theresa May will attempt one final desperate roll of the
dice on her Brexit deal, issuing a stark warning to mutinous Brexiters that
they must approve her offer by next week or face a long article 50 extension.
The prime minister was humiliated yet again amid chaotic
scenes on Wednesday night in parliament, as her cabinet ruptured three ways and
MPs inflicted two more defeats on the government to demand no deal should be
taken off the table permanently.
In an unprecedented night of Tory splits, four cabinet ministers,
Amber Rudd, David Mundell, David Gauke and Greg Clark, defied their party’s
last-minute whip and refused to vote against the government’s own motion, after
it was amended to rule out any prospect of no-deal Brexit.
Six other cabinet ministers also splintered to back a
separate proposal for a “managed no deal”, despite the prime minister’s warning
that the plan was doomed.
After her defeat, May signalled she would gamble one last
time on forcing through her Brexit deal, bringing forward a motion on Thursday
on delaying Brexit which would “set out the fundamental choice facing this
house”.
If MPs agreed a deal, she said, the government would request
a “short, technical extension” to article 50, a hint that May plans a third
meaningful vote next week.
Without an agreed deal, she said, there would be a “much
longer extension” that would require the UK to take part in European parliament
elections. “I do not think that would be the right outcome,” May said.
In a defiant reply, Steve Baker, the vice-chair of the
European Research Group of hard Brexiters, said rebel Eurosceptics would not be
cowed. “I’ll say to the government now, when meaningful vote three comes back I
will see to it that we keep voting this down however many times it’s brought
back.
“Whatever pressure we’re put under and come what may, please
don’t do it, keep going back to the EU and say: ‘It won’t pass.’”
Other Tory rebels sounded far less certain. Simon Clarke
said there was “a gun to my head at this point” and suggested he could back the
deal next time.
“I think voters will appreciate we have a very, very limited
range of options left if we want to actually honour the manifesto commitment to
leave at all. Now it’s effectively a bad Brexit deal or no Brexit at all, which
is absolutely ghastly.”
The prime minister’s warning of an extended Brexit delay
followed a disastrous night in parliament for the government. MPs amended May’s
motion ruling out no deal on 29 March to a much more radical proposition,
ruling out no deal altogether.
That amendment, originally proposed by the Tory backbencher
Caroline Spelman but brought to a vote by Labour’s Yvette Cooper, passed by
four votes.
After a frantic conference on the floor of the Commons,
panicking whips demanded that Tory MPs now vote against the government’s own
amended motion – but were still resoundingly defeated by a majority of 43.
The minister for disabled people, Sarah Newton, resigned
from the Department for Work and Pensions in order to vote in favour of the
amended motion and a slew of other ministers also abstained, including the
energy minister Claire Perry, solicitor general Robert Buckland, defence
minister Tobias Ellwood, business minister Richard Harrington, digital minister
Margot James and foreign minister Alistair Burt.
Sources close to the abstaining ministers claimed they had
been given the nod to skip the vote. It was indicated by sources on Wednesday
night that cabinet ministers who abstained did not intend to resign and Downing
Street said they would not be pushed.
Mundell, the Scotland secretary, said he could not in
conscience have opposed the amendment. “I’ve always opposed a no-deal Brexit.
The house made its view clear by agreeing the Spelman amendment. I didn’t think
it was right for me to oppose that,” he said. “The PM has my full support in
her objective of leaving the EU with a deal to deliver an orderly Brexit.”
Remainer cabinet ministers urged their colleagues not to
back Spelman’s amendment, believing a thumping victory for the government
motion would send a strong signal to Eurosceptics.
An alarmed Spelman then attempted to withdraw her amendment
but was barred by the Speaker, John Bercow, who said the amendment could be
moved by other supportive MPs. Cooper moved the amendment instead and the
government was defeated by four votes.
The vote does not definitively preclude a no-deal Brexit –
MPs must still agree a deal, or extend or revoke article 50 in order to do that
– but it underlined both the strength of feeling at Westminster and the
government’s loss of control.
May’s warning about a potentially lengthy delay to Brexit
came as it emerged the DUP is back in talks with senior government figures
about what it would take for them to back May’s deal at a third Commons vote. A
party source said “channels are open”.
Jacob Rees-Mogg told the Guardian’s Today in Focus that his
opposition to the government deal was “not a cunning plan to get us to no deal
by default” and said he could vote for the deal if it was backed by the DUP.
Discussions are taking place around a point that Rees-Mogg,
the ERG chair, raised in the House of Commons before Tuesday’s vote, relating
to “how article 62 of the Vienna convention could be used”.
Stephen Barclay, the Brexit secretary, replied that the UK
would have the ability to terminate the withdrawal agreement “if the facts
clearly warranted that there had been an unforeseen and fundamental change of
circumstances”.
An ERG source said this had been written by the attorney
general, Geoffrey Cox, but had not made it into his final legal advice on
Tuesday. “If we’d had it earlier in the day it could have changed the vote,”
the source said.
Earlier on Wednesday night, May was also forced to allow a
free vote on an amendment by Tory backbenchers based on the so-called Malthouse
compromise, which suggested a 21-month transition to no deal.
The amendment was comfortably defeated by Conservative MPs
and opposition parties, 374 votes to 164, but the vote drove an even deeper
wedge into May’s fracturing cabinet.
Six cabinet ministers voted in favour of the proposal: Gavin
Williamson, Jeremy Hunt, Penny Mordaunt, Andrea Leadsom, Sajid Javid and Alun
Cairns – many of them tipped as future leadership candidates.
In the aftermath of the vote, Brussels warned that the
Commons vote blocking a no-deal Brexit was meaningless. A senior EU negotiator
described it as “the Titanic voting for the iceberg to get out of the way”.
A commission spokesman said it was “not enough to vote
against no deal – you have to agree to a deal … We have agreed a deal with the
prime minister and the EU is ready to sign it.”
EU on no-deal Brexit motion: 'like Titanic voting for
iceberg to move'
European commission makes clear no deal remains on table
unless agreement is reached
Daniel Boffey in Strasbourg and Jennifer Rankin in Brussels
Wed 13 Mar 2019 21.14 GMT First published on Wed 13 Mar 2019
11.25 GMT
Brussels has said a vote by UK MPs to block a no-deal Brexit
in any circumstances is a meaningless move, with one senior EU negotiator
describing it as “the Titanic voting for the iceberg to get out of the way”.
A European commission spokesman offered a withering
assessment of the decision by MPs to ignore Theresa May’s assertion that no
deal was the default position unless there was a deal in place by the time of
the UK’s departure.
“We take note of the votes in the House of Commons this
evening,” the spokesman said. “There are only two ways to leave the EU: with or
without a deal. The EU is prepared for both. To take no deal off the table, it
is not enough to vote against no deal – you have to agree to a deal. We have
agreed a deal with the prime minister, and the EU is ready to sign it.”
MPs voted by 312 to 308 to support a backbench amendment
ruling out a no-deal Brexit and striking out a phrase in a government-backed
motion noting that no deal remained the default position in UK and EU law if an
agreement was not ratified. They then voted on the amended motion, which won by
a majority of 43.
On Thursday, MPs will vote on whether to request an
extension of the article 50 negotiating period beyond 29 March until 30 June.
But the commission is pushing member states to take an
uncompromising position.
Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief negotiator, speaking to the
European parliament in Strasbourg earlier on Wednesday, questioned whether the
EU should offer extra time for talks, leading officials to prepare for all
options to be on the table at a leaders’ summit next week.
“Why would we extend these discussions?” Barnier asked. “The
discussion on article 50 is done and dusted. We have the withdrawal agreement.
It is there.”
During a private meeting before his public comments, Barnier
advised senior MEPs that at present there was no consensus among the EU’s
member states over an extension, let alone on the conditions that would be
attached.
At the same time, the EU’s deputy Brexit negotiator, Sabine
Weyand, told EU ambassadors that she feared the Commons was “divorced from
reality”.
Quoting private remarks by the Dutch prime minister, Mark
Rutte, Weyand concurred with his description of the decision to vote for no
deal as “like the Titanic voting for the iceberg to get out of the way”.
Weyand said the second defeat for May’s deal on Tuesday
night showed that “a short technical extension” of article 50 talks should be
ruled out. A long extension would only be on offer in the event of a general
election or second referendum.
But France and Germany are among several countries who want
to see more flexibility.
It is understood the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, had
let it be known during a summit in Sharm el-Sheikh last month that she would
regard an extension until the end of June, by which time European parliament
elections will have been held, but MEPs will not have sat, as relatively
straightforward.
Merkel had said an extension up until the European elections
at the end of May was “very easy”, with a delay until the chamber convenes in
July described as “easy”, sources told the Guardian.
The ambassadors concluded at the meeting with Weyand that an
extension could be decided only by EU leaders, who will assess the question at
the summit next Thursday, and will need to agree unanimously on any response to
a request.
While various extension times have been mooted – from five
weeks to 21 months – there is no consensus. Member states have refused to
endorse a commission proposal that any extension should be a one-off.
The thorny problem of the need for British MEPs in the event
of an extension beyond the European elections starting on 22 May was raised
during the meeting with ambassadors.
The EU’s lawyers said it was a “grey area” if the UK
remained a member state between May and the end of June but that MEPs would
almost certainly be needed to be elected after that.
The lawyers said a mooted treaty change to avoid such a
scenario was not possible as the shortest such revision had taken two and a
half years. “That’s dead,” said a diplomat involved.
With Downing Street likely to try to put May’s deal to the
Commons again in the coming days, the German foreign minister, Heiko Maas,
said: “Germany has prepared itself in the best possible way for the worst-case
scenario. However, we still hope that we can avoid an unregulated Brexit – it
is still in the hands of the House of Commons to do that.”
Brussels figures were reluctant to speculate in any specific
terms about what the EU might demand in response to an extension request |
Olivier Hoslet/EPA
EU braces for Brexit extension request
EU capitals want to prevent an extended divorce process from
clouding the European Parliament election.
By DAVID M.
HERSZENHORN, RYM MOMTAZ AND MAÏA DE LA BAUME 3/14/19,
12:15 AM CET Updated 3/14/19, 12:27 AM CET
Prolonging Brexit? In principle yes, but give us a reason.
That's the demand from EU officials and national capitals on
what U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May needs to explain if she requests an
extension to Article 50 beyond the March 29 departure date.
But with political turmoil loosening May's grip on events in
Westminster and another dramatic government defeat Wednesday evening, EU
officials were reluctant to speculate in any specific terms about what the EU
might demand in response to an extension request.
Following the vote in the House of Commons to rule out no
deal on March 29, the prime minister will bring further votes Thursday on
potentially extending Article 50. Her plan is to offer MPs either a short
technical extension if they approve her Brexit deal in the coming days — in
order to give time to pass necessary legislation — though it was highly unclear
what might lead to a different outcome in a new ratification vote.
Alternatively, MPs would be presented with the prospect of a
longer extension, which could mean the U.K. having to participate in the
European Parliament election in May. That would be deeply unpalatable to
Brexiteers and politically toxic for the governing Conservative party. In any
event, the EU27 will be under no obligation to grant the U.K.'s particular
request and could well counter with their own terms.
May’s implicit demand — that scores of British MPs make a
complete about-face and reverse their vote from Tuesday with no new concession
from the EU — suggested that political gravity was strongly pulling toward a
long-term extension, provided that the EU27 agree.
May, in her statement, said she opposed a long extension. “I
do not think that would be the right outcome,” she said.
In a statement after the vote, a European Commission
spokesperson said the British parliament had failed once again to choose a path
forward on Brexit and that rejecting a no-deal scenario was insufficient.
“We take note of the
vote in the House of Commons this evening,” the spokesperson said. “There are
only two ways to leave the EU: with or without a deal. The EU is prepared for
both. To take no deal off the table, it is not enough to vote against no deal —
you have to agree to a deal.”
The spokesperson added: “We have agreed a deal with the
prime minister and the EU is ready to sign it.”
EU27 ambassadors met on Wednesday morning ahead of the
evening no-deal vote to consider the possibilities. The only thing they could
agree for certain, according to officials briefed on the session, was that the
decision on an extension and its terms must be taken directly by the 27 heads
of state and government. Those leaders will meet at a summit in Brussels next
week, where they are expected to hold their first formal discussion of what an
extension might look like.
"The decision is so political," one senior EU
official said. Diplomats and officials in Brussels are expected to prepare a
list of potential options and the various implications and consequences for the
heads of state and government to consider, but without expressing any
recommendation or preference.
In Strasbourg, where the European Parliament was holding a
plenary session, the EU's chief Brexit negotiator, Michel Barnier, expressed
deep unhappiness over the uncertainty but also laid out some of the clearest
parameters on an extension request.
"If the United Kingdom still wants to leave the
European Union and leave it in an orderly fashion, then this treaty that we
negotiated with Theresa May's government over the past year and a half remains
the only treaty available," Barnier said.
Noting the upcoming votes in the U.K. parliament on
preventing a no-deal scenario and on an extension, he said: "It will be
for the British government to tell us — I hope positively — how it wishes to
proceed, to finally bring together a constructive majority for a proposal. It
is the U.K.'s responsibility to tell us what it wants for our future
relationship, what its choice is, what its clear line is. We must now ask that
question before asking about any possible extension."
And he emphasized that any extension must come with a
purpose. "Extending the negotiation: for what reason? The Article 50
negotiation is now over. We have the treaty. It is here," he said.
At the Commission's regular midday news conference, Chief
Spokesperson Margaritis Schinas repeatedly declined to speculate.
"I think there again we have been very clear in the
past, we haven't received any request for an extension," he said.
"Should there be a U.K. reasoned request for an extension, the EU27 will
stand ready to consider it and decide by unanimity."
Asked what constituted a "reasoned request" he
said, "I will not venture into a typology on what a reasoned request would
be. I would simply state the obvious that a reasoned request is a request based
on a reason."
Across Europe, other officials could only guess at where
things might be headed.
"It's not clear to me how what hasn't been solved in
two years could be sorted out in a few weeks," German Europe Minister
Michael Roth said in a radio interview. "There would have to be a
constructive and forward-looking suggestion — perhaps also one that's capable
of getting a majority — on the table from the British side, which explains how
they see all of this. And I don't see that at the moment."
Roth and several other officials said that the EU would
almost certainly grant some kind of extension if requested, simply to avoid
blame for a no-deal outcome.
"If there is a longer delay, more than a few weeks or
beyond July 1, then Britain would have to take part in the European elections —
and I have my doubts about whether that could be implemented," he added.
French President Emmanuel Macron, too, stressed that an
extension had to come with a reason.
"If there's an additional delay, [the British] will
have to explain to us what it is for, and that it won't be to renegotiate a
deal we negotiated over the course of months," Macron said at a news
conference in Nairobi.
An Elysée official said an extension would have to involve
"a vision, concrete plans; we won’t have an extension to find ourselves in
the same mess in a few months." The official added, "Right now, the
29th of March is the deadline, and we are preparing for a no-deal Brexit."
The French official said that an extension request from the
U.K. had to be reasonable but also noted the problem of the European Parliament
election and said France would prefer that Britain's situation be resolved
before the new Parliament is installed.
"Until June, OK, but beyond we will have a
representation problem with the election, which will involve other
issues," the official said. "So we have a preference for the
extension to end by the beginning of the summer. Brexit can’t halt the European
electoral process."
Austria's Finance Minister Hartwig Löger suggested there
could still be a resolution that did not require an extension: "The Brexit
negotiations are like poker. There is no significant movement until the last
second. But in my personal opinion, there will be a solution at the very last
moment."
Lili Bayer and Philip Kaleta contributed reporting.
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