Matthew d’Ancona: The only escape hatch from this horror show is a fresh public vote
The sound you heard immediately after MPs’ gasps of astonishment at the scale of last night’s Commons defeat was a herd of unicorns being released from their paddock. Reality bit – and then fled the scene.
According to the prime minister, some amicable discussions with senior parliamentarians, a bit of leeway from Brussels and a few tweaks to her EU deal will end the logjam. According to Jeremy Corbyn, Brexit is only a secondary issue, subordinate to the higher goal of securing a Labour government: once he is in Downing Street, everything will be fixed.
The hardline Brexiteers say that a free trade agreement or a no-deal exit is the answer. Other factions call for the UK’s continued membership of the customs union, or the single market, or both. They must know that none of these constitutional configurations will command a Commons majority – mustn’t they?
In principle at least, this evening’s no-confidence motion is the final obstacle to a full debate about Brexit itself rather than the prime minister’s personal merits (we know she’s useless – but, odd as it may seem, that’s not the most important issue facing the country today).
The question is whether MPs have the courage and honesty to conduct this collective inquiry and to confront its inevitable conclusion: that there is no magical Brexit tree to be shaken, that the 2016 referendum was a colossal exercise in political mis-selling, and that there is no form of departure that also delivers the best features of EU membership.
The only escape hatch from this horror show is a fresh public vote. But who dares lead our political tribe of unicorn-worshippers towards this inconvenient truth?
• Matthew d’Ancona is a Guardian columnist
Katy Balls: A general election could break the deadlock
After suffering the worst Commons defeat by any British prime minister in modern history, Theresa May faces an agonising choice: tack to a softer Brexit and risk fracturing her party for good – or hold firm on her Brexit red lines and risk remain Tories turning on her in a confidence vote.
The prime minister has a few days at least to work out which is the least worst option. Although Jeremy Corbyn moved to table a no-confidence vote in the government after the deal was defeated by an eye-watering 230 votes, May ought to win this comfortably. The DUP, European Research Group and Tory remainers all say they are sticking with May while she plans her next move.
Of that next move, May has told MPs she will move to seek consensus with figures from across the main parties on the best way forward. In truth, she has little choice in the matter. There are plenty of Conservative MPs willing to vote against the government in whatever way necessary to secure a softer exit from the EU and, crucially, avoid a no-deal Brexit.
The issue is that it’s hard to see what path to a Brexit deal May can now take which doesn’t involve permanently fracturing the Tory party in two. In order to win bulk Labour votes, May could need to commit to a permanent customs union – an act that would dismay a bulk of Tory MPs.
At cabinet this week, Tory party chairman Brandon Lewis warned the prime minister of the dangers of such a manoeuvre – making clear the party would not take well to the government cosying up with Labour. It’s for this reason that the chance of an early general election has increased significantly. If May can’t find a way forward for her party an election could be seen as the best way to break the deadlock. As one government aide put it last night: “Get your holidays in now.”
• Katy Balls is the Spectator’s deputy political editor
Aditya Chakrabortty: Labour must call for a second referendum
Amid the breathlessness and hurly-burly of the next few days, remember one essential fact: this entire fiasco was dreamed, planned and executed by the Tories. David Cameron imposed the vote in order to quell backbenchers worried that Ukip would take their seats. Peacocking around international summits, he assured other leaders that remain had it in the bag. Theresa May summarily triggered article 50, and started the clock running with neither game plan nor allies. To placate Jacob Rees-Mogg and the other headbangers, she spent two years denouncing any attempt at a Brexit compromise as a betrayal … then the last six months trying to sell a compromise. Last night’s historic, humiliating defeat is her just deserts.
Nevertheless, it is a mess that the rest of us will first have to stew in and then clean up. Certainly, hardly anyone who voted leave in 2016 can be beaming into their cornflakes over the current chaos. Plunged deep into a political quagmire, the country could soon also enter a full-blown constitutional crisis from which we cannot find a way out.
To avoid that, we need a complete change of mandate and plan. May’s plan is dead and if the prime minister tries to enlist Jean-Claude Juncker or Donald Tusk to resuscitate it, she will get short shrift – as both men signalled last night. The trouble is, if any prime minister had the nimbleness to change course it is certainly not the Dancing Queen. Yet she is not inching towards any exit, and the men behind her jostling to take over appear quite happy for her to do their dirty work. Hence the hypocrisy you will see later today, where Tory and DUP MPs who last night stabbed their leader in the back will vote to show they have complete confidence in her. Westminster will never so closely resemble a swamp of crocodiles.
Yet as long May keeps doing the job, nothing is workable. The obvious compromises, such as a Norway agreement, were effectively shut down by her in 2016 with her red line over freedom of movement. She will not call a general election or a second referendum. On the single most important foreign policy decision made by this country in 40 years, we have a lame duck prime minister leading a government in paralysis. Whatever happens after Brexit, mark this: the Tories have blown their name as the natural party of government for at least the next decade.
Against that backdrop, I believe the best thing for Labour MPs to do is calmly to point out that this mess is the Tories’ creation and that they can only try to restore some governance. The no-confidence vote fits that bill, but it is unlikely to succeed. Trying it again and again will likely be a game with diminishing returns, as Labour backbenchers and activists grow increasingly restive. Some will start muttering about working with No 10; others will come out for a second referendum. Events moving at this speed will not allow for inertia. So if today’s no-confidence vote goes then so too does the prospect of a general election. In that case, as I argued here yesterday, Labour should move towards calling for a second referendum to break the Westminster stalemate.
• Aditya Chakrabortty is a Guardian columnist and senior economics commentator
Gaby Hinsliff: The only practical plan is to extend article 50 and form a cross-party alliance
It wasn’t just a defeat, but a humiliation. Theresa May’s Brexit deal has been so comprehensively routed that it feels like a broader judgment on her handling of the last two years. Despite lacking a majority she seeks to dictate terms, not negotiate them, as the Tory MP Nick Boles put it. She had barely even tried reaching across party lines, Labour MPs complained, seeking only narrow political advantage.
Yet if so, she’s not alone. Jeremy Corbyn’s preferred Brexit strategy of trying to change the subject will also be torpedoed today, if parliament votes as expected against a general election. Will he then throw everything at working with the hated Tories and Lib Dems for something that can pass parliament, in the national interest? You can probably guess the answer.
Yet that’s the only practical way out, preferably via a formal cross-party process but at a pinch perhaps in a knock-out vote between the options. The more we know about leaving with no deal, the madder it looks, but it will happen on 29 March if parliament can’t agree anything else.
My heart is with advocates of resolving this via a people’s vote, but my head is worried. Never again should voters be offered choices that don’t exist in real life, so returning the decision to the people only makes sense once parliament has stress-tested the options. Yet right now only the Liberal Democrats are close to advocating that Britain remain and reform the EU from inside (which must surely be the referendum message) and no party has a watertight plan for smuggling such reforms past 27 countries expecting a returning Britain to eat humble pie.
So by all means, let’s try to extend article 50 by a few months, since we’re obviously not ready. But this time let’s not squander them.
• Gaby Hinsliff is a Guardian columnist
