MPs look to
bring back May's Brexit deal with vote on referendum
Cross-party
majority moving closer as more current and ex-Tories open to idea, source says
Rowena
Mason Deputy political editor
Tue 10 Sep
2019 21.10 BSTLast modified on Wed 11 Sep 2019 00.05 BST
MPs behind
the plan still believe Boris Johnson may try to push through a no-deal Brexit
at the end of October. Photograph: WPA Pool/Getty Images
MPs looking
to stop no deal are exploring ways to bring back a version of Theresa May’s
Brexit deal plus a vote on a second referendum in the last two weeks of
October, amid concerns Boris Johnson will still try to pursue a no-deal
departure.
Several
sources told the Guardian that MPs will spend the next few weeks working on
ways to bring back the deal – with added concessions to Labour – to the House
of Commons via a backbencher or a temporary prime minister.
MPs working
on the options said more Tory and former Tory MPs were now open to backing a
Brexit deal with a second referendum added, taking parliament closer to a
cross-party majority for the plan.
One former
Tory MP said the option was under consideration and would “certainly have to be
linked to a referendum”. He added: “We will know in those two weeks whether it
is possible or not.”
Another
former Tory said: “There is an element of seeing what the next step is from No
10. A lot would be pretty hesitant about backing a referendum until all other
options have been tried. But, more attractive, is a way of bringing a deal back
on to the table – a version of what was agreed between May and Corbyn. And then
have a confirmatory vote attached to it, or someone amends one on.”
Another MP
who supports a people’s vote said there were “a number of devices” that could
enable MPs to bring forward May’s deal for parliament to work on, and claimed
there was “lots of movement in the last 24 to 36 hours” among those trying to
stop Johnson ignoring parliament’s direction to request an extension from the
EU if a deal is not reached by mid-October.
It comes as
Ken Clarke, the veteran Tory who had the whip withdrawn last week, urged
Johnson to “put together a cross-party alliance to get a deal through,” as he
believed it could now achieve a majority with Labour MPs who regretted having
not voted for it previously.
The father
of the House told the Byd yn ei Le programme on Welsh-language channel S4C that
he would be willing to be an “honorific figurehead” for an alternative
government seeking such a compromise if Johnson does not stitch together a
deal.
In scathing
remarks about the state of politics, he described both Johnson and Jeremy
Corbyn as representing “an absurd choice for the premiership of this country”
and said the situation was the worst crisis in his political lifetime,
amounting to a “tragic farce”.
Parliament
has repeatedly failed to find a compromise, but there are signs more opposition
MPs are prepared to countenance voting for a deal.
A separate
cross-party group of opposition MPs formally launched a campaign to win support
for Brexit via a managed deal on Tuesday.
The
founders, who include Labour MPs Stephen Kinnock and Caroline Flint, Lib Dem MP
Norman Lamb and former Tory MP Rory Stewart – claimed up to 50 MPs may back the
plan. Their proposal would involve using elements of Theresa May’s Brexit
legislation as the basis for an agreement which Boris Johnson could steer
through parliament, possibly in time for a 31 October departure.
Those
supporting a second referendum would try to amend any proposal for a deal to
secure a “people’s vote”.
Several MPs
who support the people’s vote campaign said an increasing number of Tory MPs
were coming around to the idea of a confirmatory referendum to break the
impasse, including Sir Oliver Letwin, who told the BBC’s Today programme on
Tuesday: “If [Boris Johnson] can’t get a deal that he can bring to the House of
Commons and get a majority for, there’s another option of course, which is to
bring back a deal and ensure a majority for it by attaching it to a referendum.
“I think
it’s pretty clear there’s a huge number of Labour MPs, Liberal Democrat MPs,
SNP MPs, who would vote for any reasonable deal subject to a referendum and I
think there’s now an increasing number of Conservatives and ex-Conservatives
who would as well, so I think there is a majority there too.”
The Labour
frontbench would be sceptical about voting for any deal that was not negotiated
by a Labour prime minister but could come under pressure from many of its MPs
and members to compromise if it achieved a second referendum.
Any such
moves would increase pressure on Johnson to get his own deal with the EU and on
Eurosceptic Tories to back him rather than risk a second referendum.
There is
still a possibility that the prime minister could climb down on his demand to
entirely replace the backstop with another solution and settle for a more minor
tweak to the political declaration, before putting that fresh deal to a vote
and challenging the Eurosceptic holdouts to vote for it or lose the whip.
However, he
has so far been insistent that what he calls the “antidemocratic backstop” must
be removed while the EU is adamant that is not possible, leading to a stalemate
on his prospects for a negotiated deal.
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